Fear the Polish Husaria!

[m52nickerson]

I was doing some reading on Polish military history when I learned about the Husaria. They were a damn scary group. Here is the link http://www.kasprzyk.demon.co.uk/www/Army.html

I want a total war were I get to use them.

[lars573]

In honour of the Husaria.
https://img1.imageshack.us/img1/4137/polish20winged20hussar2016832t.jpg

Also a Pancerny.
https://img1.imageshack.us/img1/5171/polish20pancerny2016831cj.jpg

And who they fought an Ottoman Sipahy
https://img1.imageshack.us/img1/3789/ottoman20sipahy2016th20cent8og.jpg

[edyzmedieval]

You can always play the Pike and Musket Mod, made by a Polishman...

Long live Cegorach!

[NodachiSam]

Man they sound badass. Imagine a group of winged riders with long lances on red and white horses coming out of the mist coming at your flank! ~:eek: That is my kind of lancer!

[Steppe Merc]

They were certaintly good, and impressive no doubt but they can't beat the nomadic horsemen who they based their style and purpose after. ~D

[cegorach]

You can always play the Pike and Musket Mod, made by a Polishman...

Long live Cegorach!


Thanks for the nice words. ~;) :bow:

About Husaria - you definetely rarely can see such mixture of power and beauty, of modern equipment and excellent tactics.

It is one of those few units which were almost invincible for at least 100 years.
Even the greatest commanders and biggest armies of that time were annihilated without mercy by these professional soldiers under the command of superb commanders ( few exceptions excluded).

Definitely one of the best military units ever. :book: :charge:

Fear us - MTW VI ( RTW BI I will show later)


https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/husaria.jpg

Regards Cegorach ~:cheers:

[cegorach]

More images

in combat

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/Hussar.jpg

during parades

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/Polish-HussarScoutMilitiaman.jpg

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/RotamasterofHussarsHussar.jpg


in game

battle of Klushino - 30 000 Russians and 5000 Swedes, English, Scottish, French vs. 6500 Poles ( 5000+ of Husaria)

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/klushino.jpg

in game description

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/jeremi.jpg

Regards Cegorach ~;)

[cegorach]

Just some more images

- armour and weaponry from a museum

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/husmuz.jpg

- pictures from a Russian book

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/husros.jpg

- early version of Husaria from OiM TW ( for PMTW2 as well ~D ).
They are already better now, don't worry.

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/hus.jpg

Cegorach :book:

[dgfred]

Great pics ~:cheers: . My kind of fighter= lance, sabres, pistol and sword,
don't have to depend on one type of weapon ~:cool: .

[Colovion]

After reading a novel about Poland by Michener I have to say that the Polish Hussars are one of the most impressive military soldiers in history. Their style alone takes my breath away. Their battlefield finesse and military prowess also notable. In a time when Europe was getting pounded left right and center by the Turks and Vienna is in danger of being destroyed, the Polish Husaria coming to the rescue paints a very dramatic picture. Their flowing sashes, polished metal helmets gleaming off the arc of screaming feathers, bearing down on a horrified opponent and usually resulting in a massive rout of the enemy. They seem to me to be the epitome of their time - daring, extravagent, but powerful.

[cegorach]

Honestly Vienna was one of the last victories of Husaria. Its story really started at Lubieszow in 1577 when small Royal army defeated 8 times larger mercenary forces of Danzig rebells during the first and last Danzig insurrection (they didn't accepted the new king) - they were very loyal to the very end of the 1st republic.

The unit was the mailed fist but used with skill in XVIIth century 'blitzkrieg' employed by the Polish-Lithuanian armies.
Many times the sight of Hussars lances was enough for an enemy to keep large reserve forces which could be used very well by Polish commanders like Sobieski who simply made 'fake' Husaria by ordering some infantrymen to carry their lances behind the main formation . The trick was used against Tatar and Tatar-Cossack army twice and worked perfectly.
Sobieski was possibly the best Polish commander ever, but his most crushing victories were achieved before Vienna which was pretty easy in comparison to e.g. Chocim 1672.

There are many more interesting battles fought by Husaria than Vienna only, although this is the most famous one. ~;)

[master of the puppets]

and that is why i love my polish ancestry

[nokhor]

where did they get the thousands of tiger and leopard skins and tens of thousands of eagles feathers? did they import them through ottoman lands?

[Casmin]

The hussars! I was infatuated with them too when I first read of them.

[Kääpäkorven Konsuli]

They had nice armor, but I think Hakkapeliitat were much more scarier.

[cegorach]

I agree, Hakkapelitta didn't take prisoners, so was greatly feared, but only because of this ~;)

[Kääpäkorven Konsuli]

I agree, Hakkapelitta didn't take prisoners, so was greatly feared, but only because of this ~;)

And maybe it had something to do whit their charge too. ~;)
http://pwp.netcabo.pt/the_dementor/pm/screenshots/finnish%20cavalry.jpg
Nice picture.

[cegorach]

Of course, but Hakkapelitta was rather specialised light cavalry whereas Husaria was doing all kinds of 'jobs' and fighting all types of enemies from Sweden, Hapsburg, Russia to the Ottomans and the Crimean Tatars ~;)

+ Hakkapelitta in PMTW 2.0 ~:)

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/hakkapelitta.jpg

[cegorach]

where did they get the thousands of tiger and leopard skins and tens of thousands of eagles feathers? did they import them through ottoman lands?

Of course !

You might be suprised but there were only few wars between Poland and the Ottomans at that time:

1526-36 (???) - small and not really important,

around 1600 Polish forces pursuade the Ottomans to accept Polish influance in Moldavia,

1620-21 - major war, but doomed Ottoman invasion coudn't possibly hope to defeat Poland at that time, still Sweden used the presented opportunity to take Riga.

1634 - largely 'probing invasion' or the private war of Abazy Pasha - reformed Polish army defeated them easily despite war against Russia and the preparations to attack Swedish forces occupying Prussia.

1672 - Humilating defeat of Polish forces.

1672-75 several campaigns - neither Poland nor the Ottomans were able to win, although Ottoman losses were terrible.

1683-99 - Vienna, Parkany and Moldavian campaign despite major victories Ottoman tactics consisting of avoiding battles quite successfull - only lost territories were regained - neither Moldavia nor Wallachia were conquered despite several campaigns.

You see it was rather quiet and quite peaceful - only the eastern border was in flames all the time. :book:

Regards Cegorach ~;)

[Colovion]

I was having some drinks with some friends last night and Poland came up. The next many minutes revolved around myself relating to them on the reality of the Polish Husaria and the way they were utilized in the battle of Vienna against the Turks. They were spellbound. :2thumbsup:

[Kalle]

Hi all ~D

Kirchholm resulted in very bad Swedish defeat yes, but after this??? (and before at Stångebro when Sigismund tried to reclaim the throne of Sweden??) The Swedish defeat also was as much due to Charles IX decisions over his tired army then to the husaria :)

Did the Husaria win the battles against Gustavus II? As i recall the peacetreaty was in great Swedish favor :p

What about invasion of Poland by Charles X in the 1650:s (not a nice thing to do of course), I dont think he lost one single battle against the poles (in fact not one single battle in his career apart from the assault of Copenhagen in his second danish war) and there were many battles during his invasion. Of course he finally had to pull back, Chestokowa and gerillas aswell as other nations declaring war on Sweden forced him to do so not the Husaria :p

The husaria charge (and other polish cav) against Charles X army is often in swedish historybooks described as the medieval time riding into the annals of history since the polish knights didnt stand a chance against the massed fire of the modern disciplined swedish army :P

(In retreating from Poland Charles took the opportunity to deal with the Danes in one of histories most daring manouvers walking his army across the semifrosen ice from Jutland to Copenhagen.)

Charles XII roamed over Poland as he saw fit.

So id say Sweden largely had success against Polish arms from the time after Kirchholm until Charles XII left Poland for Russia in 1708 - about 100 years.

At all this time remember that Sweden with all provinces never numbered more then 2,5 milion people whearas Poland had much more of course.

And Sweden had to fight a lot of other enemies aswell; danes and russians mainly but others also, so even if Poland also had to do so that evens out I think.

:bow:

Kalle

[cegorach]

I was waiting for a moment when some scandinavian guys will drop in to add the ususal stuff about 'medieval husaria and swedish perfect warengine'.

Just to make sure you understand. I think that all those wars between Poland and Sweden were a wasta of time and resources - especially the Great Northern War were the balance of forces in Eastern Europe was broken for another 3 centuries ( i.e. untill the fall of the SU in 1991) and Russia dominated the region together with parasitic Prussia ( future militaristic Germany), but probably it was not possible to avoid it since Sweden was one of the poorest, backwater and conservative countries of Europe ( it was Gustavus Adolphus who really ended Medieval period in swedish history) and Poland quite opposite i.e. rather non-aggressive, decentralised, almost democratic, tolerant and rooted firmly in Renessaince from the early XVIth century. So ultimately it was destinated that Swedish armies would attack especially when Poland was involved somewhere else or experienced serious problems.
Nevertheless I have nothing against Sweden, Finland and other scandinavian countries even though most of most biased information I had from those sources, I wonder why is it so that countries which are almost neighbours and had no conflicts since early XVIIIth century know so little about each other, especially Swedes about Poland ?
History is another territory when similar biased opinions appear so often that I slowly become tired with answering weird questions and correcting strange statements - that's why I wrote these sentences above, I guess.
So please don't feel offended, but the comparison is , I think, completely true.


@Kalle

I am greateful for your information regarding allotment system and Karolingen army - it seems that you really like this period of swedish history and have very good knowledge about it, still you have to learn a lot about Polish-Swedish wars, because your statement that:
"So id say Sweden largely had success against Polish arms from the time after Kirchholm until Charles XII left Poland for Russia in 1708 - about 100 years." would suprise Charles X Gustav, Gustav II Adolph and shock poor Charles IX who didn't win a single battle against always outnumbered POlish forces.

Overall I think that Polish-Sweadish wars can be divided into a couple of periods:

1. 1600-1622 Polish total dominance

- not a single battle won against polish forces, Kircholm 1605 was a disaster, but there were also Kokenhausen (once or twice), Whitestone (I don't remember the right name) - twice, Dynemundt (sp ?) and others - I am sorry I am abroad so I have no access to more detailed Polish sources, but I have read several good books about the subject especially biography of Jan Karol Chodkiewicz.
Overall the picture is all the same - superior (numbers) swedish forces were forced to fight (often avoided battles if possible) and were completely crushed with very small casualities - at Kircholm it was around 250 dead to 9000 dead swedish mercenaries.
Still it is important to note that Polish army at that time almost completely outclassed all enemies - and not because they were so primitive - even Hapsburg forces were massacred at Byczyna 1588 and Archduke himself was imprisoned in Zamosc.

2. draw 1622 - 1635

Both armies fought to a standstill - several swedish victories and several polish, still it was Gustavus Adolphus who crushed Imperial armies in Germany, but still against Poland he had to fortify in what was, let's be honest, a swamp.
After the lost war of 1625-29 polish army was reformed so from that time regimental cannons, musketeer brigades and powerful cavalry was more than enough to subdue Swedes, sadly no battle was fought to prove who was better.

3. swedish dominance 1655-60 and 1701-08

It is often forgotten that the Deluge wasn't only swedish invasion - it was far more complicated affair with Russia, Cossacks, Transylvania, Sweden and for a period of time Brandenburg and some traitors. Only 3 or 4 cities in 1 mln kilometer large Poland were spared foreign presence.

Swedish army was winning, but the problem is that Polish had still to recover from the crushibg results of the ambush at Batoh in 1652 when 10 000 strong veteran force was almost totally eliminated ( brother of Jan Sobieski amongst them). Yes I agree that only few battles were won by Poles, but the problem was that after a victory Swedes were not able to finish off their enemies, Poles simply retreated or fled regrouped and attacked again.

It is interesting that Charles X Adolph was trying to eliminate the 'last' (as he thought) centre of resistence i.e. Lwow (except Danzig which for some reason wasn't interested in surrendering even when apparently almost whole Poland was conquered), but during his campaign in late 1655 he was harrassed so badly (not to mention that he wasn't prepared to besige so powerful fortress as Zamosc) that he lost around 50 % of soldiers and was trapped betwen San and Vistula in early 1656. It only proves how much Poles lacked infantry at that time that they were not able to finish him off.
Also so famous battle of Warsaw shouldn't happen at all because again the lack of good infantry was terrible at that time. Still a better commander than Jan Kazimierz ( good defender, but bad attacker) should coordinate cavalry charges better and it really might turn the defeat into a decisive vistory.
But it happened that Husaria charged alone - which probably never happended before or again in the history of Polish army - whole 1500 of them into swedish lines. This was really stupid, but still they broke the first line alone and almost killed the Swedish king himself.
I have no idea what losses are presented in Swedish sources, but it was something like 2000-4000 Poles to 1000-1500 Swedes and Brandenburians. During this unsupported charge Husaria suffered something around 20 % losses, still imagine how dangerous they were that they kept the entire attention of Swedish-Brandenburgian army.

So "The husaria charge (and other polish cav) against Charles X army is often in swedish historybooks described as the medieval time riding into the annals of history since the polish knights didnt stand a chance against the massed fire of the modern disciplined swedish army :P" as you see they were alone, which was useless, but typical for Jan Kazimierz.


MEDIEVAL HUSARIA

For some reason I also hear from time to time that Husaria was medieval or that they were knights.
Time to correct it here.

It is important to remember that Poland maintained only small standing army used to counter Tatar threat, it was around 4000 at the beginning of the XVIIth century and rised to around 8 000 later on. Of course there were in fact two armies: of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania and of the Crown ( Poland and Ukraine), but I counted them together.
Of course because Rzeczpospolita was a decentralised state it had more military orgainisations: Royal Guard ( around 1500), city militias ( the largest of Danzig, Krakow, Zamosc and Warsaw), private troops of richer nobles (even up to 10 000), Cossack troops ( around 5 000), army of Courland Polish vassal ( 2000 or so) etc.
The small size was useful to achieve to goals:
- not to let the king to impose his favourite absolutism or other dictatorship - he had to behave more like a president in presidential democratic system,
- not to cost too much.
In fact the small army was more like a core troops for much larger army when a war was declared and troops were mobilised. It had a large percentage of officers so quite easily could absorb much larger number of fresh troopers.
Soldiery was a profession as in other countries so entire families were fighting in army of in orther military organisations - often private troops in wild fields of Ukraine.

So when a mobilisation was declared veteran colonels ( pulkownicy) were assigned to recruit a regiment which they obviously did mostly with their more trustworthy friends/better known soldiers etc. There was often a rivalry between some colonels to get certain people to their units. Because it was a matter of trust and respect (and future employment) corruption was easily avoided - if a colonel had a certain amount of money to share with people who were supposed to trust him he had to use them all for the purpose - not like in many western armies where they could amass a pretty decent amount recruiting barefooted cripple idiots to their regiments.
New regiments were formed and some existing ones were enlargened e.g. Royal Guard which could be even 5 times larger during the time of war.
When husaria (and other polish cavalry) regiments were formed (usually most of them were employed in the standing army - were too good) soldiers were supposed to appear with all the expected weaponry (regulated by procedures) except the lance which was provided by the state.
As you see the cost of forming Husaria depended on the wealth of the population rather the amount of money from war taxes. Wages were paid by state ( + lances), but it was a future Hussar who had to buy the equipment. Tricky, isn't it ?

Well, it should be rememebered that it was a great honour to serve in Husaria - even greater to form a regiment of them (still under state control i.e. the voters it was almost democratic society) and simply it was a way to get richer because of the expected loot and quite high wages. Many soldiers got richer this way. Also for non-nobles it was one of the few ways to become a one - you can compare Polish nobility status to Roman citizenship in some way, although there were no ranks of nobility and both genders were equal - now about 60-80 % of Poles are nobles i.e. aristocracy.
Second thing was that only less than half of Hussars worn so much equipment - more than 50%
of them were armed with sabres and pistols and carbines which gave Husaria pretty decent firepower, however caracole was never used in Poland insted massed firepower at close range was employed which had disastrous effect on enemy morale. Caracole wouldn't last more than 10 minutes against enemiesw like Tatars especially since pistols and carbines were rather inaccurate. Despite this fact Hussars and other polish cavalry used decent amount of firearms, sometimes to soften enemy infantry together with the firepower of infantry and artillery ( also rockets) of the Polish-Lithuanian armies, esides sometimes you had to dismount to defend or you loose your steeds - that is a war.

They were elite formation so considered themselves much better than others, but they had good reasons to do it.
Mainly because of their tactics and weapons they were able to handle with every kind of foe.

For example lance often wasn't used against Tatars were more mobility was required and only 1,5 meter longsword (koncerz) was employed, still the Tatars feared Hussars lances greatly, so when it was possible to pin them down with infantry's firepower or light cavalry (including polish and lithuanian Tatars ) Husaria was used as a hammer to smash Tatar army.

Husaria charged in a different way than most of other western cavalry

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/Pologne2.jpg


The whole last 375 meters ( the maximum range of a musket) was travelled in less than the time required to shoot more than once or commit a suicide (the pikemen have to move forwards)- for this reason Swedes at Kircholm 1605 placed their musketeers in mixed formation with pikemen, but it wasn't enough. In addition Husaria did loosen their ranks while charging which made the formation much more difficult by firepower to tight them just before hitting thir enemies.
The very last phase of Husaria charge was made in knee-to-knee formation which gave it incredible impact, but it wasn't the end. The last phase was even faster than gallop - it is called 'cwal' in Polish and I have no idea what is the English term. Only some armies adopted this pace, because it was very hard to maintain for long, interesting thing is that Husaria was accelerating from the last rank to the first one i.e. last ranks entered 'cwal' quicker than the first ones - this straightened the formation and make it better formed before the impact.
Hussars trained as well to turn their steed and retreat very quickly, so they could charge once again very soon - now imagine their enemies sighting with relief only to learn that it could be just the first of even 10 or 15 Husaria charges.
Only the most disciplined enemies could hope to survive, and almost nothing could stop well prepared Husaria charge. This explains a lot why G.Adolph's army fortified their positions as soon as possible and chose ususally some sort of natural obstacles.
Other enemies did similar things: at Klushino 1610 enetire 5000 strong mercenary part of 35 000 Russian army hidden behind a fence and polish infantry used cannons to burn these down - later Husaria charged and convinced them that using caracole in front fo charging Husaria is asking for a miracle.

Obviously Hussars had to use incredibly good steeds to make repeated cherges possible, so they did a unique to Poland blend of western, tatar and arabic steed which was at the same time swift and large and had huge stamina - at Trzciana in 1629 Husaria had to charge 3 or 4 times during a running battle against Swedish cavalry - the distance was close to 5 kilometers and Hussars had to charge fresh enemy reinforcements after breaking through their friends kilometers before, but thay succeeded.

The most interesting thing about Husaria is how was able to smash their way through enemy pikemen. Of course I think that they wouldn't be able to break massed pikemen formations like Spanish tertio, but they never had to there would be other ways to deal with them, I am sure.

Still it seems that breaking enemy pikemen was quite usual thing for the Hussars themselves - in the memoires from the period there were comon notes such like: "and at that time as usual we broke through their pikemen and finished them off".

So how did it worked.
First thing was the dense knee-to-knee formation used against enemy infantry ( against cavalry often it was better to widen and loose the formation - it still had enough impact anyway) with 5,5 meter lances outreaching enemy pikes - lances were hollow and counterbalanced so were quite easy to handle by experienced cavalryman.
Next thing is the psychological impact of watching the entire first ranks trown away as if charged by RTW elephants. Lance is a very acurate weapon so trained hussars knew how to couse their enemies to lose their lives and drop the pike harmlessly to their steeds.
The last thing is that because pikemen rely on formation much more than anything else any holes can be used well, especially when next ranks of Husaria is shooting you to bits with pistols and first ones are cutting you with sabres (especially special Husaria ones, which were rarely used in duels because were 'killer's weapons').
Usually it is pretty enough to make enemy run.
Besides Hussars could always turn back reform and charge again...

Now imagine yourself standing in formation when suddenly you hear the flutter of infamous wings, and watching your pikemen retreating somehow far too quickly behind your regiment.
You are lowering your pike and praying silently. Next you see them quickly approaching in tight formation, lances lowered. Next you watch some of your frinds crushed, thrown away trough your ranks... Only the best could survive it, or most lucky - no wonder that western mercenaries capitulated so quickly after the fence they were hiding behind crumbled.

Of course when it wasn't necessary pikemen were not charged when in formation - after all it is always better to do it easier way.
Still Husaria was the only cavalry capable of crushing pikemen without really numerous losses.

So there is my conclusion:

Husaria is so medieval as knights (both had lances) exactly like a washing machine is a TV - both have screens... although washing gives more entertaining than some TV proposals ~;)


More later if you want. I have a frind who is a historian and currently writes his second book about Husaria, so I can give you some answers if you need. :book:


Regards Cegorach ~;)

[Kalle]

Hello :)

I was waiting for the moment when some proude Polish dude was to come back with an answer on backward Sweden and Democratic Poland :duel:


Just to make sure you understand. I think that all those wars between Poland and Sweden were a wasta of time and resources - especially the Great Northern War were the balance of forces in Eastern Europe was broken for another 3 centuries ( i.e. untill the fall of the SU in 1991) and Russia dominated the region together with parasitic Prussia ( future militaristic Germany),

Agree on the war thing - wars are hardly ever any good.


but probably it was not possible to avoid it since Sweden was one of the poorest, backwater and conservative countries of Europe ( it was Gustavus Adolphus who really ended Medieval period in swedish history) and Poland quite opposite i.e. rather non-aggressive, decentralised, almost democratic, tolerant and rooted firmly in Renessaince from the early XVIth century. So ultimately it was destinated that Swedish armies would attack especially when Poland was involved somewhere else or experienced serious problems.


Well it is impossible to say a date when the medieval times end almost everywhere I think but in Sweden historians usually draw the line with Gustav (Gustav Wasa, Gustav I and all other things he later has been called) who was Gustavus II Adolphus grandfather. Why?? Because he made Sweden a unified country through hard struggles, he abandoned the pope and introduced protestantism, he made a huge step forward in standardising the langauge through his translation of the bible to Swedish, and above all he started the creation of a state administration that since then has been one of the worlds most effective and made the Swedish expansion during the 17th century possible since it allowed Sweden to use relatively much more of its resources then the Swedens enemies.

Sweden was poor yes, backward hm, im not sure about that neither politically or scientifically but culturully Sweden was not very advanced no. Kristina, Gustavus II Adolphus daughter tried immensly hard and spended much money on making at least the Swedish court culturully leading as was fitting for a great power (for instance she brought Descartes to Stockholm where he got ill from the cold and died, but we thank him for coming :bow: )

Politically I fail completely to see how Sweden was a backward country. Not only was the administration top notch but only in Switzerland did the farmers have such a high status and freedom as in Sweden. They were represented at the parliament, the majority of farmers were free and owned their own property and as long as they payed their taxes no one could touch them. Along with the free farmers there were farmers on homesteads belonging to the crown (state) and there were farmers on homesteads belonging to noblemen and id say those few who were working on noblemens lands were worst off. Please tell me if the polish farmer had the same freedom, power and right to his own property as the Swedish one ~;)

Please also enlighten me how, what in the rest of the world is known as polish parliament (polsk riksdag in swedish), is in the frontline of democracy. Noblemen squabling about everything and one nobleman being able to cancel decissions of the rest if he so wanted - the political system probably more then foreign invaders brought Poland down. And where in this democracy were the farmers and other ordinary people? Slaving on the noblemans goods id guess :duel: .

Destined that Sweden would attack?? Gustav (I) had a son - Johan (III) who also had a son - Sigismund. Sigismund also got the crown of Poland and here was an opportunity for greatness indeed I guess but Sigismund put his effort in Poland so his uncle Charles (IX) led a fight against him since he and others thought Sweden should be ruled from Sweden and not Krakow or Warzaw. Sigismund landed with a Polish force to crush the rebellion but he failed at Stångebro against Charles who actually got a victory over the poles :charge:

So who was the attacker wel hard to say imo, depends on if you feel it was a rebellion or not and if it was a justified rebellion or not.


I am greateful for your information regarding allotment system and Karolingen army - it seems that you really like this period of swedish history and have very good knowledge about it, still you have to learn a lot about Polish-Swedish wars, because your statement that:
"So id say Sweden largely had success against Polish arms from the time after Kirchholm until Charles XII left Poland for Russia in 1708 - about 100 years." would suprise Charles X Gustav, Gustav II Adolph and shock poor Charles IX who didn't win a single battle against always outnumbered POlish forces.

Happy to give you good information :)

I allready showed that Charles IX won a battle, a more important one then Kirschholm as it ment Sweden was to be ruled from Sweden not from Poland. It also ment that Sweden continued as a protestant country.

And as for my timeline well lets push it forward another ten years then to the 1620:ies and as far as I can see we then are in agreement that Sweden was largely (not completely successful). And lets not forget that if Swedish forces were more numerous when the Poles won in the early 17th century the other way around is true for the later wars. Charles X and Charles XII did not have superior numbers when fighting the poles instead it was the other way around.

Also you say Poland was in so much trouble fighting on all fronts well so were all of Polands neighbours also, Sweden not the least. You can bet your a.s that allmost everytime Sweden was at war with someone those sneeky danes would try a backstab ~;)


After the lost war of 1625-29 polish army was reformed so from that time regimental cannons, musketeer brigades and powerful cavalry was more than enough to subdue Swedes, sadly no battle was fought to prove who was better.

Well and from where did they get those ideas for reform?? Regimental artillerypieces was Gustavus II Adolphus idea I tink:bow:

And lets not forget that Charles X was tought how to wage war in the army that Gustavus had created and we all know what happened when Charles X and polish met in battle :charge: :bow: (Charles lost vs Poland vs gerilla movements and the national rising after chestokova as said in my earlier post, he did not loose against the obsolete husaria. :charge: ~:cool:

Finally you have a friend who is a historian, please tell me the name of his books if they are in English as im intrested in this time of history exactly as you and would love to read about the husaria charges (i dont mean the husaria were bad troops if you get that impression from reading my posts).

Btw I am also a historian ~:cool:

Kalle

[cegorach]

'I was waiting for the moment when some proude Polish dude was to come back with an answer on backward Sweden and Democratic Poland'

No, no, no ! Kalle you should have written something like 'I was waiting fr the moment when some POlish guy will answer with usual stereotype/biased information/something else' - it doesn't sound so good and not at all agressive or passionate.

Anyway that is good the thread is becoming more interesting.

Good auti-irony with this Descartes travell, I must admit.

'Politically I fail completely to see how Sweden was a backward country. Not only was the administration top notch but only in Switzerland did the farmers have such a high status and freedom as in Sweden. They were represented at the parliament, the majority of farmers were free and owned their own property and as long as they payed their taxes no one could touch them. Along with the free farmers there were farmers on homesteads belonging to the crown (state) and there were farmers on homesteads belonging to noblemen and id say those few who were working on noblemens lands were worst off. Please tell me if the polish farmer had the same freedom, power and right to his own property as the Swedish one '

I hardly can see such good status as a mark of beeing more modern than anyone. The reasons were simple:
1. Sweden was similar to Switzerland in that way taht it was scarcely populated, so the status of local communities was obviously enhanced,
2. Small number of nobles or urban dwellers meant the king had to build links directly with peasants,
3. There was hardly any opposition to the king and it was hard enough not to submit the rural folk - without the support of the monarch it was impossible - who simply played the peasant card against all others. It also explains why the support was so strong even though the losses during wars were so terrible.

Besides the situation of the polish peasant was evolving towars full freedom which cannot be said about its neighbours - for some reason entire villages were running away to Poland - especially in the XVIIIth century. Freedom for peasant refugees (and soldiers) guaranteed in first european written constitution ( that of Poland from the 3rd May 1791) was the major reason of Russian invasion in 1792, especially since Polish army remained mostly professional not conscript force.

'Please also enlighten me how, what in the rest of the world is known as polish parliament (polsk riksdag in swedish), is in the frontline of democracy. Noblemen squabling about everything and one nobleman being able to cancel decissions of the rest if he so wanted - the political system probably more then foreign invaders brought Poland down. And where in this democracy were the farmers and other ordinary people? Slaving on the noblemans goods id guess'

I knew it would happen... The name is used in Swedish and Danish ONLY - because Polish Parliament was seen as a complete opposite to neat and tidy Scandinavian parliaments where all kings proposals were accepted and all the taxes were given.
'Squabbling' is a part of DEMOCRACY - especially when the country is so diverse like Poland at that time.

And please - one noble not making something possible - it is a fairy tale - YES it is true that the belief that every nobleman is equal led to the belief that everyone should agree, but the truth was that NOONE even tried to disagree if he didn't have serious support.
Veto was a mark of the bad situation of Poland - not the reason of it. I think it should never appear, but I dare say that Polish Parliament was very efficient for that time as well as local gatherings of similar status.
Again veto happened BECAUSE the country was in crisis ( 70 years of constant wars didn't helped), not it caused the crisis. True it fuelled it further, but Polish parliamentary system recovered from it - alone and against foreign influence when the society overcame the crisis.
I must admit that liberum veto appears too often - but it was so simple -Russian and Prussian governments claimed they were 'liberating' people in Poland from 'anarchy' so they justified it so hard that it became the major myth about POland.
Tell me one thing - how did the absolutism work ? I have the feeling that it wasn't any better than Polish 'anarchy'.

True it was limited democracy - that is why I said it was 'almost-democratic' system - it was nobles' republic and peasants generally had no rights. It is unjoust I agree, but it was XVI-XVIIth centuries - in many countries the situation was much worse and in no other the power of the king was so limited - but too strong in my opinion - they did too much harm anyway.
So see it this way - yes in Poland only 10 % ( or a little more) had full rights (both genders !), but other classes of the society ( except peasants i.e. 75-80 %) were represented by lobbing, local gatherings or autonomy ( like in Royal Prussia with Danzig or in Riga or amongst Zaporozhian Cossacks or in larger cities etc.) - in political systems with 'puppet' parliament or none at all EVERYONE WAS A SLAVE.

'Destined that Sweden would attack?? Gustav (I) had a son - Johan (III) who also had a son - Sigismund. Sigismund also got the crown of Poland and here was an opportunity for greatness indeed I guess but Sigismund put his effort in Poland so his uncle Charles (IX) led a fight against him since he and others thought Sweden should be ruled from Sweden and not Krakow or Warzaw. Sigismund landed with a Polish force to crush the rebellion but he failed at Stångebro against Charles who actually got a victory over the poles'


So you say that Polish-LIthuanian-Swedish-Finnish state should be ruled from Sweden ?
I dare say that it would make no sense at all - there was not a single reason to do this. The very idea was to elect a Swedish heir to make a frind from the possible enemy like with Lithuania. If the union survived Swedes and Finns would be POlonised like LIthuanians, Belorussians, Ukrainians, Germans etc - it is the matter of cultural supremacy not imposed policy.
Sigismund was elected to make Baltic 'the sea of the Republic and cut Russia of the Baltic Sea. There was strong belief that it is the best idea, because it worked before with Lithuanian Grand Duchy, Royal Prusia, Livonia, Courland and almost worked with Moldavia, Transylvania, Wallachia and Prussia - even in Russia and Crimea there were pro-POlish parties. The problem was that Swedish society lacked opposition to future Charles IXth reign, was conservative Lutheran ( so intolerant), obviously afraid of beeing 'swallowed' in the Commonwealth and besides the very personality of Sigismund who was fanatically catholic worked well against him both in Poland and in Sweden - most of political crisises in the Republic were driven by this man.
Still I think that the union had better chance than that with Russia which was even more conservative - almost bordered paranoia, but Charles IX believed as well in conspiracy theories ( mostly Catholic), which didn't help at all.

You see the center of the universe wasn't going to be in Sweden, although the Republic was a federation so it would have its autonomy, faith and law intact - the inevitable Polonisation would be a differet thing, but it was NEVER imposed - sometimes it worked against us , I must admit - especially in Ukraine where the elites polonised so quickly that it was the Cossacks who formed the seed of the future Ukrainian nation, ufortunatelly so rebellious in the beginning...

'I allready showed that Charles IX won a battle, a more important one then Kirschholm as it ment Sweden was to be ruled from Sweden not from Poland. It also ment that Sweden continued as a protestant country.'

First thing - it is hard to say it there were at all any Poles at Stångebro - about the entire affair I only heard that:
POles only lent artillery to Sigismund and that once during a battle Sigismund prohibited some Poles from his bodyguard unit to charge the Swedes which would be seen as emplying foreign, catholic troops against lutheran countrymen and fuel only Charles IX support.

I will find more, I promise - I have extensive 'network' to ask the questions.

And about protestant Sweden - you are only probably right, but only in long terms - because protestant territories of Poland remained protestand and didn't lose its autonomy, even stranger they opposed Polish enemies sometimes even more than any other part of the country ( e.g. Danzig against Swedes in 1626-29 and 1655-60, against Prussia 1700-93 and against Russia in 1733-34). Of course beiing the part of the republic meant accepting religious tolerance so Catholics in Sweden would have to be tolerated - there is something like LUtheran sectarianism and intolerance as well and Charles IX was an excellent example of people believeing too much in Jesuit conspitacies.
The revival of Catholic faith in Poland and its future supremacy ( still no intolerance) was the consequence of several things one of them that it was all non-catholic enemies which Poland was fighting and jesuit schools were very popular - because no inquisistion was possible in the Republic they had to adapt as everywhere, in Poland they founded schools.

'Also you say Poland was in so much trouble fighting on all fronts well so were all of Polands neighbours also, Sweden not the least. You can bet your a.s that allmost everytime Sweden was at war with someone those sneeky danes would try a backstab'

Yes, but Sweden had the ultimate weapon which was its fleet - this way it actually always could choose the moment to strike without risk of invasion.

'Well and from where did they get those ideas for reform?? Regimental artillerypieces was Gustavus II Adolphus idea I tink'

Yes, the army of the Republic used every kind of inspiration which was good enough.

'the obsolete husaria'

????????? Please explain... do you mean it was outdated or something ?


'Finally you have a friend who is a historian, please tell me the name of his books if they are in English as im intrested in this time of history exactly as you and would love to read about the husaria charges'

I will ask him -maybe there is something, although I don't think there is a book describing Husaria indetails - there are only few in Polish -because Husaria was one of those things which the Communists found 'anti-Russian' o gerenerally unfriendly and too 'imperialistic'.

Besides my earlier post was based on several POlish ones.

There is going to be an Osprey book from warrior series about Husaria - released in 2006, I hope.

For now there are 4 books I would recommend:

Polish Army 1569-1696 two volumes and The Army of Gustavus Adolphus two volumes as well - all by Richard Brzezinski and all from Osprey publishing.
In addition you might like to read Lutzen 1632 - author and publisher still as above - I am using this one to make a historical battle for PMTW both editions.

There is only one serious mistake I have noticed - the author forgot that at Kircholm it was mostly mercenary army which the Poles were fighting - not swedish national troops.
BTW - I have recently discovered that Kircholm was fought for less than 30 minutes !!!
It makes this battle in PMTW 1.0 almost real-time.




In addition two Polish formations -

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/staryszyk.jpg

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/nowyszyk.jpg

so called Old Polish Order - used at Kircholm and other battles in early XVIIth century and more firepower oriented new formation after military reformas of Wladyslaw IV Vasa and Koniecpolski.

Regards Cegorach

[cegorach]

Another image - it is from quite old polish board game - pretty good in recreating tactics of both sides - I must admit

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/kircholm.jpg

[Watchman]

For some reason I'm getting the feeling this has turned into a bit of a national match. Anyways, I've a policy of always getting my neck hairs all a-bristle when something gets hyped up too much - something ceg and, for that matter, the site the original poster linked, have a bad habit of doing.

For one, AFAIK the Hackapells (or Hakkapeliitat as the name goes in Finnish) are seriously overrated. To my knowledge their contemporaries didn't find them anything particularly special - tough fighters for cavalry of their "weight", but then that much may just as well be thanks to an exceptional commander. Still tended to get badly bloodied by Imperialist cuirassieurs (once they dumped the caracole and started fighting aggressively too) in a straight fight in any case, and like most Swedish cavalry of the Thirty Years' War relied heavily on the close support fire of musketeer brigades against heavier troops.

Anyway, given the hideous campaign attrition rates of the period and the difficulties in getting reinforcements all the way from back home, odds are that most of the time the "Finnish" Hackapells were about as ethnically homogenous as any other military unit - not very. Most likely the ranks tended to be largely filled with "foreign" mercenaries even if for one reason or another attempts were made to keep the unit "national" - during the TYW the Swedes actually tended to use their own draftees as occupation and garrison troops anyway (as they were considered more reliable) and partly by necessity used mostly mercenaries in their field armies.

These days Finnish researchers tend to suspect the light cavalry unit in question received a fair bit of extra glory from the National Romanticists of the late 1800s, who as one might imagine tended not be overly picky about details.


I cannot help but suspect something similar is going on with the Winged Hussars (hereafter Husaria for short). Certainly by all accounts they were a highly capable cavalry force, able to take on all comers on at least equal terms; and obviously their battlefiald C&C was superior to at least that of the average grade of late-medieval and Renaissance European heavy cavalry.

But then, so ? High degree of mobility, coordination and battlefield control are pretty much the prequisites of being able to fight an opponent as tricky and dangerous as the steppe nomads with even a decent success rate; if that level of maneuverability and professionalism is coupled with European-style lance-shock tactics, then it is only natural the end result is pretty darn lethal.

Clearly the Poles managed to develop a highly effective "weapon system" that, at least for a while, proved to be superior to most anything that confronted it. This isn't exactly a new scenario, though; only recently the Hussite wagoneers and the Swiss phalanxes had laid claim to the exact same achievement, and they too eventually fell prey to their own success - when their winning method eventually lost its keenest edge and stopped being as unbeatable as it used to be, they either did not realize it in time or were too committed to the method to be able to change it sufficiently. This is a *very* old story, really - the demise of the war chariot in far Antiquity was very similar.

Be that as it may, one gets the strong impression the Husaria ultimately relied on "cold steel" shock attack with, as it were, "some guts behind it" and being able to shred the opposition in the ensuing melee. That this technique was employed with high degrees of coordination and professionalism, or that the Poles could do it better than their opponents, doesn't make it any less essentially "medieval" - this approach was actually the norm for heavy cavalry all over Eurasia except the relatively isolated westernmost end (ie. Europe) where things got rather degenerate and sloppy at one point (the High Middle Ages mainly).

Conversely, the system to which most European armies went for in the Early Modern period was that of a true mass army. As they were made up of dubiously trained conscripts and mercenaries they couldn't really realy on skill, bravery and élan to carry the day in the thick of things; they were all about iron discipline, cohesive units and individual soldiers compensating for deficiencies in skill and equipement with machine-like teamwork. The trend had actually started back in the Middle Ages, its first true exponents probably being the Swiss although the more capable infantry forces, be they peasant levies of urban militias, had long had the right idea going too. Its undeniable success made it the continental norm, and when pushing the technology of the lance, horse and armour to their conclusions proved to be an insufficient response the cavalry arm could not but follow suit.

However good they were at it, it remains that the military method of the Poles was ultimately that of a previous era their foes to the West had already discarded. The old method still worked for quite a while, partly as the others had yet to work out the bugs from the new one, but ultimately its time was rapidly drawing to a close.


Personally, I find it difficult to believe the 5.5 meter hollow lance was quite as effective against infantry pikemen as is claimed. It's simple mathematics, really. Of the 5.5 meters, at least about 0.5 if not more goes to being couched under the arm. Past that, it ought to be roughly a meter before the lance projects past the head of the horse. That leaves about four meters of "business end" reaching forwards from the rider/mount combination.

Infantry pikes tended towards a similar 5.5 meter lenght, or thereabouts (longer having proven to be far too unwieldy). Now, when a front-rank pikeman "sets" his weapon to receive a cavalry charge he does so by stepping on its butt, grippin the shaft with his left hand, taking a fairly low, wide and quite stable semi-crouch (not unlike the basic stance of many martial arts, really), grips the hilt of his sword with his right hand in preparation of the melee, and angles his pike so that the tip is approximately at the level of the horse's chest.

However you look at it, that leaves most of his weapon (probably about five meters in terms of practical reach) projecting in front of him. Added to this are the second and third ranks behind him, who prepare to receive the charge with different stances and grips (I understand they hold their pikes horizontally).

Now, unless there's something seriously flawed with my scenario thus far it would seem to me that even with his extra-long lance the Hussar's horse is getting shish-kebabed on the tip of the first pike while the tip of his lance is still about a meter away from the front-rank pikeman - and even should he get past the first pike-tip, he'll reach the second one around the time his lance hits the first pikeman...

I'm sorry, but given that late-medieval knights on plate-barded horses found pikemen nigh unassailable I have severe problems believing the Husaria on their unbarded mounts would fare much better even if they had unusually long lances. Among the fundamental truths of military history is that disciplined heavy infantry is a very frustrating opponent for even the best heavy cavalry, even if they don't have proper "anti-horse" weapons; spearmen are doubly so and much more dangerous, and pikemen - they were the foil of men on horseback everywhere they turned up. The much-maligned caracole skirmish tactic was specifically an anti-pikeman invention, and not terribly effective at that...

Mind you, I've yet to get around to reading Englund's Den oövervinnelige properly where there would no doubt be informative discussion on the topic, but I did cursorily leaf through it a while ago. One part that caught my eye mentioned that during Carolus X's Polish foray the Polish cavalry found the massive pikeman-shielded firepower of the Swedish infantry all but insurmountable, but usually had the upper hand in straight cavalry fights. After all, the effective range of the wheellock pistol against an armoured opponent was around five meters... The pistol-toting Swedish cavalry was overall badly out of its league against the Husaria. They simply did not have the firepower to distrupt or turn back a massed charge at long range, and as a result the Poles were usually able to press home with their lances. Naturally a massed lance charge crashing into a squadron of comparatively lightly armoured cavalry wrought some terrible damage and very likely threw the formation into disarray - and particularly if unit cohesion was distrupted the more skilled and aggressively minded Poles, mounted of faster, stronger, more agile and likely better-trained horses, would usually pretty much demolish their hapless Swedish colleagues in the ensuing whirling melee.

Similarly, fully modern British "redcoats" received several nasty beatings when irate Scots were able to push a "Highland Charge" into their ranks; if the "modern" soldier could be deprived of the benefits of his cohesive formation, then the more freewheeling and individually more aggressive (and usually more skilled) "medieval"-minded fighter would tend to have him for breakfast.

[cegorach]

Good to see you - any ideas to answer for my PM BTW ?

I have found some info about the swedish 'campaign' of Sigismund III, I will post it soon and aswer the latest posts as well :bow:

[Kalle]

I aint gone either :p I just havent had either time nor strenght to post anything more in this topic yet ~;) :charge:

Info also coming on Erik XIV reforms.

Kalle

[m52nickerson]

Personally, I find it difficult to believe the 5.5 meter hollow lance was quite as effective against infantry pikemen as is claimed. It's simple mathematics, really. Of the 5.5 meters, at least about 0.5 if not more goes to being couched under the arm. Past that, it ought to be roughly a meter before the lance projects past the head of the horse. That leaves about four meters of "business end" reaching forwards from the rider/mount combination.

Infantry pikes tended towards a similar 5.5 meter lenght, or thereabouts (longer having proven to be far too unwieldy). Now, when a front-rank pikeman "sets" his weapon to receive a cavalry charge he does so by stepping on its butt, grippin the shaft with his left hand, taking a fairly low, wide and quite stable semi-crouch (not unlike the basic stance of many martial arts, really), grips the hilt of his sword with his right hand in preparation of the melee, and angles his pike so that the tip is approximately at the level of the horse's chest.

The Lance was up to twenty feet in length. That is around 6.6 yards. Know I know that a yard is longer than a meter, so the lances could out reach the first line of pikes.

[Ironside]

The Lance was up to twenty feet in length. That is around 6.6 yards. Know I know that a yard is longer than a meter, so the lances could out reach the first line of pikes.

Cough
1 yard = 0.9144 meters ~D

And the problem is that pikemen keeps a dense formation so killing the first pikemen still gives a massive amonts of pikes to damage the hussaria.

Now I'm quoting someone in Swedish (Swedish forum), but can you find any case of hussaria beating pike-equiped Swedish infantry by charging frontally through the years 1617-1660? http://forum.skalman.nu/viewtopic.php?t=18117&highlight=pik

[m52nickerson]

I don't think they every fully charged a full unit of Pikes that were ready to receive a charge. They did not have to, remember they were armed with muskets, as well as bow and arrow. Now if they hit a unit that did not have time to set there pikes, or had taken a some losses, it was then that there lances reach came into its own.

[Watchman]

Uhh... right. You know nick, the exact only source talking about such absurdities as "twenty-foot lances" is the site you originally linked in your first post; and, frankly, it gets so many other details so seriously wrong as to be functionally discredited for most any purpose. Ceg, whom I consider to be a rather more reliable source despite his blatant biases, quotes 5.5 meters as the lance lenght which is a) a rather more credible figure than 6+ b) corroborated from other sources I've seen plus what else I know of these things.

Blunt fact of military history: horse that tries cold-arms shock action against steady, formed pike has a bad habit of getting skewered with very little to show for it. Even if they're eventually able to chase off the pikemen, they will have suffered disproportionate casualties and most importantly will have fought almost entirely without the benefit of their initial impact, which has a tendency (more like an iron rule...) to get utterly dissipated by the pike-hedge. Frankly, most of the time heavy elite cavalry was best off dismounting and fighting on foot if that was an option.

'Course, this requires the pike hold steady and don't wet their pants and start wavering. I strongly suspect this - a flat out shortage of quality - to be about the single biggest reason for the sorry demise of Swedish infantry against the Husaria in the early years of the 1600s, as by what I know of it Gustavus II Adolphus had to give the military system he inherited several full-spectrum overhauls to get it into a serious winning shape.

In Western Europe cavalry had, by the 1600s, coexisted with decent pike for over two centuries already. Bitter experience taught them that frontal shock action just plain wasn't either very feasible or worth it, regardless of how insanely sophisticated and protective armour they donned (plate armour reached its peak only a fair while after the introduction of pike, after all, and managed to obsolete that other thorny issue - longbow). Yet they still needed to be able to fight pike on the field somehow.

What they turned to was something that had actually throughout history proven to be the most workable solution for horsemen faced with overly stubborn and dangerous heavy infantry - missile skirmish tactics. Their weapon of choice for the job, and for that matter the replacement of the lance for shock duties, was the newfangled wheellock pistol or rather a pair of them. Now, wheellock pistols aren't frnakly that great weapons. In campaign conditions the things are frighteningly unreliable (dud rates as high as 20% have been quoted), you're lucky to hit anything with them past ten meters, and the things carry premium prices (Swedish bookkeeping from the TYW suggests that a pair of pistols cost as much as a munitions-grade cuirassieur armour). On the other hand, they're light, comparatively easy to use and certainly far more convenient to carry around than a lance, have a decent chance of going through even "proofed" armour (which was only ever worn by cavalrymen on the field due to its weight) from five paces, and work right well as highly lethal close-combat weapons with a very flexible "reach envelope" to boot.

And most importanly a horseman could drop a pikeman without any real fear of reprisal. Given the dense formations pikemen had to use, and their comparatively thinner armour, pistol-toting cavalry could happily shoot them up from some ten meters or so. The issues with the reloading times of the guns were dealt with by what was essentially a mounted version of the infantry countermarch - the first rank of horsemen would discharge their pistols and then retreat behind the formation to reload and the next rank did the same, then the next one... you get the idea. This kept the infantry under a constant hail of fire.

Now, pikemen didn't tend to operate by their lonesomes. The Swiss, the real trailblazers of the art, had from the start made sure their armies had about one crossbowman or handgunner per two heavy infantrymen, and the missile troops had ever since been an integral part of pike blocks. This was for mutual protection too; the missile troops could shoot up enemy shcok troops (particularly cavalry and other pikemen) before the clash, and more importantly could return fire against enemy missle troops - the abortive Scottish flirt with pikes had fallen foul of lack of missle support for one, allowing the English to shoot them to pieces with their new longbows... Conversely the pikemen kept enemy shock troops - particularly cavalry - from casually squashing the missile troops.

Now, the fact is that any semi-decent long-arm outshoots a pistol in both range and power. But as the skirmishing cavalrymen had two pistols each for every musketeer's gun, and could retreat behind their still-loaded companions to reload, and hence had a distinct advantage in the volume of fire, and to boot were armoured well enough to be reasonably musket-resistant at the ranges they preferred to fire from, a close-range firefight was by no means automatically in the infantry's favour - all the more so as the cavalry could with virtual impunity ride down any isolated musketeer groups or even sufficiently distrupted pikemen.

But the number of musketeers (both absolute and relative) and the quality of their weapons improved rapidly; and in turn so had the cavalry tactic. This eventually led to the final form of the caracole, where the horsemen were formed ten or more deep and could keep their foes under a constant, withering hail of fire. There were also lighter-armoured mounted musketeers - known as harquebusieurs in the early 1600s - supporting the pistol-toting cuirassieurs with their wheellock carbines. In its chief role, that of opposing the troublesome pikemen, the caracole worked well enough - it's not like there's any particularly more sensible way for horse to fight formed pike, anyway. The problem was that the people using it were almost all mercenaries; as the caracole tactic had the effect of keeping their own skins relatively intact and their expensive horses out of the line of fire for much of the time, they tended to use it for other purposes too regardless of its actual suitability (such as fighting other cavalry). As their commanders were equally concerned with the bottom line, if not more so as they were often the ones who coughed up the dough for the trained men and horses, they weren't exactly adverse to this trend nevermind its comparative tactical inefficiency in many situations.

Well, the Swedes re-learned the shock action principle from the Poles and reintroduced it to the European military stage - when pistol-toting cavalry with only harquebusieur (support cavalry)- level armour kicked the ass of cuirassieurs (heavily armoured assault cavalry) it sort of got people thinking. Well, they learned fast enough, and soon the lighter Swedish horse was having some marked trouble with newly aggressive Imperial cuirassieurs...

However, methinks they all still reverted to skirmish tactics against enemy pike. One does suspect that the eventual adoption of the bayonet (resulting in nearly immediate and universal demise of the pike) came actually as a bit of a relief to the cavalry arm - as much is hinted at by the fact that post bayonet the cavalry soon started reverting en masse to cold-steel close combat which had been so suicidal against the pike.

But then again the realities of extended campaigning (mainly the endless marcing around) meant that, by the end of the Thirty Years' War, full cuirassieur armour which was a bit of a pain to haul around had virtually universally been reduced to a simple breastplate plus helmet, which the trooper could wear on march without problems.

In the early 1600s the Poles had been to a large extent able to hand the Swedes their arses on the open field. The next time the Swedes turned up looking for a fight, in 1650s, they were a whole different bunch and had a nasty habit of handing the Poles their arses on the open field. By what little I've thus far read of The Invincible, the Polish dearth of decent infantry became one of their more pressing tactical issues as the cavalry had sort of serious problems with confronting Swedish foot directly. A well-drilled combined-arms unit of pikes, muskets and regimental artillery just plain isn't something even the best horse can effectively charge frontally - and to boot the once moribund and feeble Swedish cavalry, if not quite as good in straight hand-to-hand combat as their Polish colleagues, was now able to at least put up a serious fight and thoroughly enough drilled to be able to outmaneuver the Husaria on a squadron level.

[m52nickerson]

I agree with you Watchman. I never meant to imply that the Hursaria were some unstoppable super unit. I'm just prod of the fact that Poland at one time had probable the best cav in Europe.

[cegorach]

Soon I will be back :book:

[cegorach]

All right let us start.

First - I am a little lazy so I will quote myself - this is a description of Husaria charge.

Quote:
Winged Hussars didn't have much in common with knights except 3 things
- that they were cavalry,
- that they were wearing armour,
- and that they were using long lances, but those of the Husaria were hollow, which is often forgotten...

Their charge was one of more difficult ones to learn and to stop.

First they usually dyployed in 3 lines with infantry units and artillery between their formations

like here

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/pologne.jpg

Next they were charging in waves

One line of units at a time - so they started charge in loose formation accelerating minute after minute. Next around 100 m from target they tightened formation accelerating even more starting with those soldiers from behind so their formation kept perfect shape even when it was necessary to replace losses from enemy firepower.
Next they hit the target which could be enemy pikemen ( they were the only cavalry able to break enemy pikemen formations charging in front of their lines) - their first two ranks were using 5.5 meter lances which unhorsed enemy raiders, hit enemy pikemen throwing them like broken dolls creating massive holes in enemy formation ( like elephants in the RTW) ready to explore by rank 3, 4th and so on which were using pistols to create more havoc.
If the charge was not enough they were able to retreat quickly to replace broken lances, reorganise and give more time to their infantry to cause more mess.

The enemy had a huge problem now, because if they survived the first charge at the very moment when the first one stopped and the first wave of Hussars retreated another line ( from those 3) started charging, so enemy could face several ones, one per few minutes...

If the first charge was successfull ( they were targeted usually into enemy flanks to envelope the entire battleline and kill them all) lighter cavalry called Kozacy was used to support Hussars ( like armoured carriers with infantry support tanks) to enlarge the holes and rout the enemy.

Generally you had to be very brave, experienced, fortified or lucky to survive and to win.

The Swedes became a kind of experts at this, but after 20+ years of carnages ( lost all battles before Walhoff in 1626 if I am correct about the date) against forces several times smaller than their.
Contrary to the popular beliefs their cavalry stopped caracoling quite early - because it was seen as horrible tactic against Polish rapid moving armies, but you had to do much more.

Gustav Adolf learnt to use massive short range volleys together with numerous artillery, field fortifications, use of terrain unsuitable to cavalry and his own reformed cavalry to counterassault, but still it was hard to stop Husaria like at Warsaw when around 1000 Hussars broke through their line - unfortunatelly it was terribly coordinated without any support which was supposed to attack at the same time, well... John Casimir was a bad offensive commander.

So please be careful, because I have learnt to my cost that many Swedes ( including historians and writers) see Husaria as a kind of 'outdated knights' which is not true at all. :wall:





As you see it is much different than knightly charge or something, according to mu studies it is quite similar to moldavian tactics who used it to defeat enemy horse archers ( they used supporting cavalry with bows to keep the enemy under constant pressure). Husaria used this 'wave' charge and although it required very well trained ( so expensive) horses able to turn quickly on spot it was very efficient.


- Now husaria and enemy pikemen.

The way they handled 2nd and further ranks of enemy pikemen is a matter of speculation, although ( again my opinion - only recently studies about the technical side of their charge were started) I think it worked more or less like domino - first rank was thrown disrupting further ranks more or less, supporting firepower ( cavalry with firearms, infantry and artillery) helped of course - it was all about making the charge easier, why not.

- Any successfull charge after 1617 against Swedes ?

I have found only one in 1622 at Mitawa ( Mitau) where Husaria broke through enemy infantry, but supporting western cavalry refused to help them.

Later it didn't happen, but it doesn't mean it was impossible or so, simply for the next several years Swedes refused to fight unless when well fortified ( Mewe/Gniew), making suprise assault themselves ( Walhoff, first day at Tczew/Dirschau, Gorzno - every time outnumbering the Poles BTW) or suprised after trying to suprise them ( Trzciana/Honigfelde). In fact isn't it interesting that Swedes can only count 1 battle as unqestionable victoru during the war 1626-29 and it was at Gorzno where they suprised less than 1800 Poles with 3 times bigger forces ?
Notice that when forced to fight in a 'normal' way ( Trzciana) they lose even if their army is bigger than Polish.

Of course you can say that fortified position can be taken anyway, but Gustavus Adolphus had quite a similar situation at Alte Feste in 1632 with Wallenstein refusing to fight - the result was a disaster - the army was falling apart and an Imperial cuirassier charge caused a carnage among Swedish-German trops.


Of course there is always the whole Deluge thing, but at that time unquestionably Polish army was of much weaker quality - it was still recovering from disastersat Korsun, Szepielewicze and especially Batoh which was similar to Poltava i.e. a veteran, excellent quality force was annihilated with prisoners killed by the Cossacks ( act of refenge for Beresteczko one year earlier), the difference is that the Poles menaged to crush Russian army in 1660 nonetheless which cannot be said about the Swedish forces after Poltava, but recovery requires time, I am sure everyone will agree with it.
For example the number of Husaria reached the lowest during the whole XVIIth century - it was less than 1000 when Swedes invaded and reached 1800 only after some long period of time.
The quality of Polish troops was never more than medium during the whole Deluge, whereas the Swedes used army of veterans of 30 years war. Add to this the fact that the usual infantry recruitment zone was taken at the beginning and kept for very long time and there is no wonder that Polish forces suffered from the lack of footsoldiers for the whole war - infantry was essential and was always present at quite large numbers in every victorious battle ( except wholly cavalry forces when it was replaced by dragoons), no doubt about it.

Still I can present some examples that indeed a different, less fortunate army faced Husaria with their pikemen and failed. I mean the Russians and their foreign type infantry. Their pikemen were broken again and again - on 22nd September 1633 at Smolensk, at Polonka in 1660 and even at Basia in 1660 where their forces used field obstacles, but this time ( apparently smaller and less disciplinated firepower mattered) Husaria broke thorugh them anyway.

According to all studies I have read it is obvious that massed firepower if possible supported by obstacles and terrain unsuitable to cavalry ( like at Mewe/Gniew 1626) could stop Husaria, pikes didn't matter much. They could be useful against other types of POlish cavalry, so were kept anyway, but couldn't stop Husaria.
In fact even Karl Gustav himself ( according to one of his Scottish officers - Patrick ( ??) Gordon - I must chack) told them not to wait with pikes for Husaria, but to move aside, because 'it cannot be stopped in this way'.

Let me now ask you - do you know A SIGLE EXAMPLE of a Husaria charge which was stopped by enemy pikemen ??? I couldn't find one !

It eaither reached enemy lines and broke through them or was stopped by enemy firepower.


Now something else.

More about 'medieval polish army' - I still didn't got 'the Invincible', but I have read several pages nonetheless, I will buy it because of the descriptions of the war against Danemark, but after reading the several pages - selected where anything about Polish army is written - I can say one thing - THE AUTHOR HAS VERY WEAK KNOWLEDGE ABOUT POLISH ARMY !!!! I have asked several forum members including professional historians and they have the same opinion.
I want to read it completely and than I will be able to add the required quotes, but apparently the writer didn't notice the entire HUGE difference between Polish army from the XVth century and later reforms ( starting with first in 1464) in early XVith century ( first fully professional army with large artillery and firepower), creation of the Quarter Army ( around 1568), Bathory's reforms ( e.g. new hungarian style infantry without pikemen, creation of Husaria, the last heavily armoured cavalry is removed), Wladislaw IVth's reforms ( regimental cannons, official dragoon units, western style polish recruited infantry etc) and many smaller between.
I was amazen that the Husaria can be treated as a relict of Medieval age from the first moment I have read it in the ORG, but apparently it is by some people, so let's add few facts which make it even harder to claim - proving is impossible, but claiming is, but will be ??

- dismounted Husaria

Husaria could and quite often dismounted and fought armed with muskets - mostly it happened during sieges or defending the camp ( like at Korsun in 1648), but could happen when required in every battle e.g. at Hammerstein/Czarne in 1627 - a number of Hussars and polish reiters dismounted and created defensive position among bushes stop Swedish retreat.
Of course Husaria was far to precious as cavalry, so it was pretty useless to dismount them every blody time, besides there were dragoons to fight this way if infantry was unavailable.

- lending armour

It is most curious thing, but it happened. I have found one situation when infantry borrowed Husaria armours to protect some of them when crossing a river on boats ( it happened close to Lojow/Loiv in 1649) and in fact there was no problem with it. Why because they were professional soldiers and knew what they should do if asked to do something sensible. Even if the infantrymen were eaither citizens or peasants and Hussars were from nobility.
Now tell me how many times Imperial cuirassiers gave their armours for any reason to other people, especially from infantry ?

- converting Husaria

Another interesting thing. It was quite easy to convert Husaria to polish ( different than western) reiters, to lighter cavalry or opposite from reiters or lighter Pancerni or Kozacy.
The missing/unsuitable equipment was removed or given and you have a different unit now.
It is especially interesting because Polish reiters, Kozacy and Pancerni were supporting cavalry i.e. using carbines or pistols ( RARELY BOWS) who could even perform caracole when required !
True it was pretty useless against the usual enemies i.e. Tatars and infact the only enemy against it COULD BE USED were western model armies, this way it makes it even more impressive, since Poland fought western type armies only from time to time, almost constantly engaged in running battles against nomads or Russians.

- lance

Apparently accoring to some historians their lances were clearly the ultimate proof that they were last medieval knights or something.
Maybe time to say something about it.
First thing is that the lance itself was a completely different weapon - longer, but much lighter, ecause HOLLOW and in fact one-use only.
Second they were provided by the state - it was required to have the same type of them, required by their formation and tactics.
Its origin is from Balcans, probably from Hungary where light ancestors of Husaria were using 3m hollow lances against the Turks - the soldiers were from late XVth-early XVIth century and were completely different than any knights. Hungarians kept those lances even when their Hussars bacame heavier, but in Poland it became longer because it was useful against Russian cavalry and Lansknecht mercenaries ( like at Lubieszow in 1577 where 2500 Poles defeated 10 000 rebels and mercenaries).

Besides if everyone who uses a lance is a knight than even Bunschuh ( german peasant rebels) cavalry Free Lancers can claim to be them as well.

Lance was very good untill early XXth century and in XVIIth century it was clearly very efficient weapon, better than pistol, because more accurate and more devastating during a charge. see for example Scottish cavalry from second half of the XVIIth century itself - it abandoned pistols entirely and used 2,5 m lances to great effect against English Ironsides. The problem is that Husaria never abandoned firearms, pistols were their ESSENTIAL i.e. required equipment.

- firearms

Sometimes these horse archers capture imagination too much, sometimes historians see them everywhere and in large numbers...
In Polish army bow was rather rare weapon - it was used by a part of light cavalry and almost always it was secondary missile weaponry used because its impressive rate of fire, accuracy and range. The only type of Polish cavalry were Tatars in Polish-Lithuanian service and even some of them used firearms as well.
The difference between firearms ( carbines, pistols, muskets) and bows in use of cavalry was that firearms were requiread ( sometimes provided by the state) and bows were usually taken by the soldiers on their own. Bows never dominated.

- firepower of polish infantry

Hungarian style infantry adopted in Poland used interesting tactic when attacking enemy - it deployed in 10 ranks with only the last one standing.
It closed to their target, kneeled ( except the last rank) and started shooting from the last rank which stayed standing either to reload or to take their sabres and wait untill the first rank shot their weapons. After this fireassault the whole unit charged often lying for a moment to avoid enemy salvo and to assault when it was mosts unconfortable for the enemy.
In fact it is interesting how similar it is to swedish tactics - both Gustav Adolph's and later Ga Pa.
I don't think that it is a coincidence, because Swedes had the opportunity to observe it quite many times and it was very efficient way of discharging your firearms.
Add to this the fact that ammunition was kept by Haiduks in paper catridges and you will have even more similar situation, though G.Adolph's forces didin't use them so often as usually claimed.

- Husaria armour - heavy cavalry or what ?

It is important to remember that Husaria armour, their steeds and weapons are still quite similar to reiters like Ironsides - if you take out the wings, the lance and the koncerz lance-like sword you will have reiters wearing slightly different armour ( tougher armour on chest) and animal skins. That is all !
They were not using three-quarter armours, never !

Also their tactics were varied and western cavalry itself sometimes attacked in the center ( Malborough's favourite tactic), but they didn't have the special Husaria tactics and the lances to break through enemy pikemen, so they didn't try.
Besides Husaria assaulted in the required way, so it was used to outflank the enemy probably more often than the other way.

Their equipment and tactics means they were like western heavier cavalry, but not like knights in any sense.

- knights because nobles

This is the biggest misunderstanding with Husaria. It is often said that because they were nobles they were like knights.

The question is were they really nobles and what about western cavalry.

First - according to law only their officers were supposed to be nobles and quite often citizens or (seldom) richer peasants were among the Hussars. The very membership of Husaria was highly valued and no wonder - like in every army there are elite units soldiers would like to join.
The same with Husaria.

Second - also in western europe cavalry was the preferred formation nobles liked to fight in and they did, so why not in Poland.

Third and final thing is that polish nobility was far more numerous - about 10-15 % of the population, in some regions ( Masovia) it reached 33 % !
Of course they had bigger or smaller property, but another unique thing was that there were NO RANKS in polish nobility ( and both genders had the similar rights - sometimes the same - e.g. voting), accoring to the law all were equal.

This way joining the highly valued Husaria was away to make yourself more respected and/or popular.

The high number of nobility ( growing number - it was inherited by both genders) meant that a large part of the army consisted of them - it was the majority of cavalry, about 20-50 % of Dragoons and even a part of infantry ( not very popular). In the XVIIth there were about 1 400 000 memebers of nobility in Poland ( currently it would be about 30 000 000 - a perfect situation when everyone is in nobility and it explains why monarchists were never popular and democratic movements so strong) and even when most of them were rather interested in peaceful life still a number was high enough to provide the army with volunteers ( especially cavalry) and why so many POles were mercenaries at that time.

You can compare it with Spain, but there nobility was especially numerous among the infantry - no wonder cavalry was hard to obtain in Iberian penninsula.

All for now.

I hope someone will try to counter this post without posting some biased rubbish, please prove that I am wrong and biased, I am waiting for your arguments and proofs. :inquisitive:

Regards Cegorach :book:

[Kalle]

I fint it admirabale that you write such a long post saying things you have allready said and not really adding anything new. I remember reading about the long lance, and most of the other things you say here earlier in posts written by you.

I also admire that you allready deem possible answers will be biased meanwhile you think your own posts are not :2thumbsup:

May I ask what is wrong with "the Invincible"? Did Swedish forces not win at Warzaw?? (the polish army was much larger then the Swedish one also). Does the author not describe how Sweden and Charles X are forced to abondon plans on occupying Poland??

It is not correct that the firepower and the discipline of the swedish infantry was to much for horsemen (call them knights, husaria or whatever you want) charging with their lances straight at them?? Thus it would not be wrong to describe as the middleages charging into history.

Wasnt the treaty of Altmark a victory for Sweden and a loss for Poland?

Wasnt the combination of artillery, inf and cav in the model in your post something learned from Gustavus Adolphus??

Didnt Sweden steadily expand in Balticum at the cost of, among others, Poland?

Was the organisation of the Polish army and the high number of polish noblemen and the governing of the realm really good and effective??

You say others are biased, I think you are. Even when the Husaria got their arses kicked (at warzaw) you find up excuses for it. If they were as good as you say and since they had done it before why didnt they manage to rout the Swedish army without problem?

There is no doubt the Husaria were great, the many victories you have pointed out demonstrates that clearly but they were far from unbeatable and Sweden proved it.

I would love to play your mtw-mod but I fear I would not enjoy it since I fear I will see Husaria all over the map each and every singleplayer game and no unit being able to counter them in multiplayer. :no:

Also you speak of Swedish army after Poltava that it could not rise again. It did so very soon. After Poltava all old enemies again declared war on Sweden, Denmark landed in Scania and were beaten by Stenbock with the newly drafted second army. That army was then shipped over to the continent winning at Gadebusch against various enemies but later forced to surrender at Tönningen.

A third army was raised after Charles XII came home florm Turkey with which he twice tried to wrestle Norway from Denmark as some sort of last attempt to change the outcome of the war. The second invasion was an invasion prepared in a way with depots and all such things that had not been seen before. Charles was shot though during this invasion and that was the end it.

Kalle

[KrooK]

OK at the beginning I would like crush some stereotypes.
Polish parliament into XVI and 1st half of XVII century was simply I - D - E - A - L. Swedish and british parliaments were much less developed than polish one. Why - because (and it's strange but true) everyone felt that future of country depend on him.
Do you want example of "polish parliament"???
Despite during elections one vote "against" bill could crush bill (because 100% votes "for" were necessary), people simply didn't vote "no". They were telling that they don't think this bill will be good and it was all.

Maybe other example?
Once upon a time polish parliament wanted enact "Act against prerogatives".
MPs decided that they should give good example - so they went to king and gave every prerogative they took. Without any force.

Do you know that polish nobles (mostly catholics) enacted bills about tolerance called Warsaw Confederation. Same time rest of Europe was fighting on religion wars. So talking about "polish parliament" as example of mess, in XVI and 1st half of XVII century is simply JOKE.


Kalle sorry that we don't tell that Swedens are undefeated but they were being defeated many times. Swedens were winning when Poland was weakened by enemies or when they have massive human andvantage.
During Warsaw battle husaria's charge did what they expect for it. Swedish army was in mess and Poles lost because other units didn't attack.

BTW lances got 5.5 metres lenght. Husaria could break heavy infantry with pikes because pikemen from XVII century weren't pikemen from XVI centrury.
There were 1/3 or even 1/4 pikemen and 2/3 (3/4) musketeres. Musketers stood into some rows. Into husaria regiment there were about 200 soldiers, they were charging into 4 rows. After researching about these charges it appeared than into decisive moment there were 1,5 meter beetwen 2 pikemen and 0,5 meter beetwen 2 husaria soldiers. Connect it with information that husaria lances were simply longer than pikes and husaria attacked partially from flank.
When husaria broke 1st line, it caused mess into enemy formation and then it was easy. Pikemen from other rows couldn't use their pikes because their friends ran into their direction.

Leopard skins for husaria armour were being imported from turkish empire. Same like some parts of weapon (part of sabres from Siria). Furthermore horses were turkish origin (they were strong and easy to train). Horses equipment has been imported from Persia (im not sure about it but i think so).

[Kalle]

Hi Krook,

Explain please how Poland with the best and most enlighened government, the best military and so on wasnt able to win the wars against Sweden in the 17th century.

I see no attempt to look at your own history with critical eyes, its only Poland best, Husaria best, all attacked poor Poland and so on.

You complain about having many enemies, you complain about having few people and so on.

Let me tell you that Swedens population was ten times smaller then Polands. Poland was in most aspects a richer country then Sweden. Sweden had at least as many enemies and wars going on as Poland.

The battle of Warzaw you almost see as a Polish victory, thats just silly. I could in the same manor explain why Sweden really won at Kirchholm. If only Charles hadnt ordered troops to attack... Sweden would win Kirchholm.

The facts are:

Sigismunds landing in Sweden to reclaim the country - he was thrown out at the battle of Stångebro.

Treaty of Altmark = Swedish victory

Swedish steady expansion in Balticum at the expense of Poland. First Estonia (from German order) then Lifland.

During the war in the 1650ies Poland was almost utterly defeated by the Swedes. Only a national uprising saved Poland and Sweden did not have manpower or financial power to hold back the entire population of Poland fighting guerilla warfare, it was not troops like the Husaria (proved by battle of warzaw) that forced charles to retreat.

Charles escaped with his main army intact, marched it to Denmark who had declared war on Sweden and defeated Denmark resulting in the peace of Roskilde, giving Sweden vast Danish territories.

Great Northern War, Swedish troops marched across Poland as they saw fit. Charles XII singlehandedly forced Krakow or if it was Warzaw, cant remember, to give up.

Now please dont answer with Kirchholm and so on again. I do not deny those battles happened and that Husaria massacred the poorly led Swedish army on that occasion and other.

I really dont know what the point is that you Krook and you Cegorach are trying to make. Husaria and other polish troops good yes. Swedish troops good yes.

Husaria unbeatable no. Poland unbeatable no. Sweden unbeatable no.

Kalle

[KrooK]

Kalle I think I will never explain you cause you don't want understand.
I think you got problem because since 1815 Sweden is peaceful, neutral country and didn't check itself during war - so you can only mention historical victories.

I never claimed Poles almost won battle of Warsaw - I told husaria did their job - turned 1st line of Swedens into mess.

Husaria really was great unit and you can't deny. Tell me if swedish cav or infantry unit was undefeated for 110 years. Swedish army was good but you can't tell that polish was worse only because you won when Poland has been exhausted. Look that in the end of nothern war great Swedish army lost Inflants , Estonia and Finland. Russians weren't better - they got simply more men.
Similar was with polish army - during 1655-1660 war Polas has been simply totally exhausted. War with Russia, Tatars who hijacked 500.000 pps on Ukraine during greatest civil war into our history - we were really exhausted.

Anyway you asked me to tell when polish cav broke swedinsh inf after 1617 - tell my why after? Swedish inf has been worse there?:oops:

[Kalle]

I think you got problem because since 1815 Sweden is peaceful, neutral country and didn't check itself during war - so you can only mention historical victories.


I dont have a problem with a long period of peace, Im very hapy with the long peace Sweden has enjoyed and enjoys. I really dont see what that has to do with this discussion.

Battle of Warzaw - And here i thought it was the Husaria who was turned into a mess, guess I was wrong :dizzy2: lmao.


Husaria really was great unit and you can't deny.

Read my post again and you will see I do not deny it.


Swedish army was good but you can't tell that polish was worse only because you won when Poland has been exhausted. Look that in the end of nothern war great Swedish army lost Inflants , Estonia and Finland. Russians weren't better - they got simply more men.


So Poland was exhauested from 1620ies and onwards?? Again with the excuses. What about Swedens constant wars in Germany, Denmark and Russia + Poland, you dont think Sweden was exhausted??

Sweden did not loose Finland until 1809.


Anyway you asked me to tell when polish cav broke swedinsh inf after 1617 - tell my why after? Swedish inf has been worse there?

No, I do not think I asked this hahaha, where I asked this, quote please.

Anyways it would be a valid question. Fact is that from Gustavus and onwards Sweden dominated in warfare over Poland.

Kalle

[cegorach]

[QUOTE=Kalle]I dont have a problem with a long period of peace, Im very hapy with the long peace Sweden has enjoyed and enjoys. I really dont see what that has to do with this discussion.

Battle of Warzaw - And here i thought it was the Husaria who was turned into a mess, guess I was wrong :dizzy2: lmao.


----------> Into mess ? Source please ???
It was stopped, true, but you can ask what about the supporting charge of the rest of the cavalry which didn't do it due to the lack of coordination and bad orders of Jan Kazimierz.



So Poland was exhauested from 1620ies and onwards?? Again with the excuses. What about Swedens constant wars in Germany, Denmark and Russia + Poland, you dont think Sweden was exhausted??


-----------> It is not an excuse, you should notice that:
a)democratic states have different attitude towards war,
b)Sweden itself wasn't invaded untill 1717 - or something around it if I am correct, so you might see a difference...
c)absolutic, militarised states can fight wars for a very long time, especially when they need those to pay their soldiers,
d) in Sweden there was no opposition against wars - see c),





No, I do not think I asked this hahaha, where I asked this, quote please.

----------> It was Ironside

Anyways it would be a valid question.

-----------> I answered it recently,

Fact is that from Gustavus and onwards Sweden dominated in warfare over Poland.

-----------> Not during G.Adolphus reign - he would be suprised reading that he 'dominated'

Later, true - but haven't you heard about the war against Cossacks and Russia from 1648, about Batoh ?
I posted it recently.

More later.

[cegorach]

[QUOTE=Kalle]I fint it admirabale that you write such a long post saying things you have allready said and not really adding anything new. I remember reading about the long lance, and most of the other things you say here earlier in posts written by you.


-------------> Many yes, but most of the post is the direct answer to some latest posts in this topic, besides I am answering even one of your letest question...

I also admire that you allready deem possible answers will be biased meanwhile you think your own posts are not :2thumbsup:

--------------> I am reading VERY MANY sources, from various points of view, because I am trying to be as well informed as possible, so I say that I am not biased. :no:

May I ask what is wrong with "the Invincible"? Did Swedish forces not win at Warzaw?? (the polish army was much larger then the Swedish one also). Does the author not describe how Sweden and Charles X are forced to abondon plans on occupying Poland??

------------> The pisture of Polish army as medieval mess, and quite many smaller descriptions - probably selection of sources could be much better and Warsaw - do you want me to prepare a detailed description of this battle ?
Saying that someone won isn't enough to make it a reliable description, because history is a complicated subject and shouldn't be descibed from one point of view.

It is not correct that the firepower and the discipline of the swedish infantry was to much for horsemen (call them knights, husaria or whatever you want) charging with their lances straight at them?? Thus it would not be wrong to describe as the middleages charging into history.

-----------> Yes it was enough to stop them, because the charge wasn't supported as it should be ( accoring to the order and plan of the battle). In my opinion the battle shouldn't be fought at all because there was only 6000 'green' infantry ( not enough) and not enough artillery and the battlefield wasn't good enough for the cavalry, but it was Jan Kazimierz idea... Still it almost succeeded.
Besides you should accept that calling someone in a certain way can affect the entire description and make it biased to extreme ( not exactly this one, but I have heard from some Swedish forum members that swedish schoolbooks make it in even worse way).


Wasnt the treaty of Altmark a victory for Sweden and a loss for Poland?

--------> True, exactly like Stumdorf and Oliva for Poland, but the question is how it was won. If I accept the Swedish superiority during the Deluge why cannot be done about this war ( 1626-29) about the Poles - how many battles were won, by whom and who was avoiding battles there ?

Wasnt the combination of artillery, inf and cav in the model in your post something learned from Gustavus Adolphus??

-----------> Yes, but it was done because infantry was more useful to make the Swedes fight or crush them if they tried to avoid it like between 1626 and 1629. Infantry is better to attack fortified positions - it ws well known in Poland ( see livionian campaign 1600-1601 and russian campaigns 1579-1582), but there was too much optimism about convincing the Swedes to fight in battle - the thing which G.A avoided most of the time.

Didnt Sweden steadily expand in Balticum at the cost of, among others, Poland?

--------> And what ? What does it mean ? Maybe it used other countries' involvement in other affais as well. Maybe it had strong fleet and homecountry beyound the reach of a country without strong fleet itself ( like Poland).

Was the organisation of the Polish army and the high number of polish noblemen and the governing of the realm really good and effective??

------------> And wasn't it ? Is democracy better than totalitarian state ? Northern Korea can mobilise more soldiers than the Southern one, but is it a better state to live ? Besides what happended to swedish conquests - it couldn't keep them and it had to fight for more to sustain its too big army. War has to fuel war...

You say others are biased, I think you are. Even when the Husaria got their arses kicked (at warzaw) you find up excuses for it. If they were as good as you say and since they had done it before why didnt they manage to rout the Swedish army without problem?

-----------> Again should I prepare a detailed description of the battle ? Winning or losing is not so simple thing, you have many examples where someone won even if he shouldn't, although at Warsaw the Swedes had better army, but why they did is another question, who was better commander etc, am I biased because I consider several factors before making a statement ??
Besides there were around 1000 Hussars at the battle - if they failed why their number was risen after the battle - it was NEVER so low - at least before 1700.

There is no doubt the Husaria were great, the many victories you have pointed out demonstrates that clearly but they were far from unbeatable and Sweden proved it.

-----------> I never said that they were invincible, but still they were perfect tool in right hands of course, a reason to be proud for the Poles, exactly as the Swedish army of that period is a reason to be proud to be Swedish. Don't you think ?
The question is however - why not describe something in more realistic and unbiased way, which Husaria should get as well.

I would love to play your mtw-mod but I fear I would not enjoy it since I fear I will see Husaria all over the map each and every singleplayer game and no unit being able to counter them in multiplayer. :no:

-----------> I don't think so. It will be hard to counter, obviously, but it will be expensive as well ( as it was).
The idea is simple - pikemen are ultimate close combat unit untill line infantry appears, Husaria is able to break them if supported, better commanded etc. Musketeers beat pikemen and cavalry beats musketeers. Still there are about 600 units and I can't guarantee that everything will be always perfect - it will be refined, perfected later after people will play it - if it goes well in exactly 14 days you will be able to try the newest 1.5 release.


Also you speak of Swedish army after Poltava that it could not rise again. It did so very soon. After Poltava all old enemies again declared war on Sweden, Denmark landed in Scania and were beaten by Stenbock with the newly drafted second army. That army was then shipped over to the continent winning at Gadebusch against various enemies but later forced to surrender at Tönningen.

A third army was raised after Charles XII came home florm Turkey with which he twice tried to wrestle Norway from Denmark as some sort of last attempt to change the outcome of the war. The second invasion was an invasion prepared in a way with depots and all such things that had not been seen before. Charles was shot though during this invasion and that was the end it.

---> True, but it still meant the end of conquests. You see it was still a terrible blow and it was hard to recover from it - Poles had Poltava at Batoh in 1652, Lithuanians at Szepielewicze 1654 ( at least to some degree) - generally Polish-Lithuanian army had terrible shape - about 80-85 % were cavalry ! Mostly local militia - usually it was 50-55 %, although against western foe infantry dominated - for the planned war against Sweden 1635 about 60-65 % were in infantry.

Regards Cegorach :book:

[Asmodai]

That was very interesting thread. Sometimes, i must :book: some information in my sources. But i have one conclusion about that discussion.

I think, that it started from the description of Hussaria, and ended on the bickering about military strenght of Poles and Swedes.

To this discussion, i may only add my :2cents: about Hussaria horses.
Someone said(Krook i think), that they were Turkish orygin. And many historians speek of Polish Hussar horse.

We can divide horses on two large groups.

Hotblooded horses are fast and agile, but lacks strenght and stamina.
Egsamples are Arab horses.
And coldblooded horses are slow, but big and strong animals. For egsample, Friesian horse.

Well, it is known fact to many horse breeders, that hotblooded horses(Arabs, Turkish and so on), grew bigger and stronger in moderate climate. Also, lush pastures in Poland in the time of our interest also helped. That horses also retained their famous speed and agility.
So, we cannot speek of polish horses as a race, cos they were Turkish or Arab horses, modified by breeders.
So polish breeders get very good, military horses. And it is notet in documents, that polish breeders rarely exported that horses.
That was in big general, but i tried to write short. I have few sources about horses, and full article about hussaria horses. I may send to PM, if someone iss interested.

Also, many historians speak of husaria as of heavy cavalry. They were rather medium cavalry. Reiters armours and horses were much heavier. Hussaria was unit created for many tasks, and fighting with steppe light cavalry was one of that tasks.

Also, i heard recently, that famed wings were not used by hussaria in battles.
this is not my theory, and i gladly hear someone else opinion about that, espetialy, cegorach1

I agree, that hussaria was very good unit, but not unstoppable.
And i agree, that pikemens and musketeers alone couldnt stop hussaria charge. Tactics of these units were different, in favour of hussaria. But if we speak of whole army, Polish and Swedish, i think, that Swedish army was better developed, organised and more efficient as a whole.
And to every Pole...we had also in our armies Common Levy(Pospolite Ruszenie), and that "formation....unit....armed and undisciplined rabble" caused many troubles to every field commander. So, we arent saints, and we have black sheeps in our ranks also.

[Watchman]

You know, one thing I've been kind of wondering about. In just about all pictures, illustrations, sources and whatever I've ever seen, the Husaria are wearing a type of laminated cuirass (ie. built up of multiple horizontal strips, although theirs seems to usually have the upper chest covered by a single larger piece), a construction known and used to good effect since far Antiquity. Now, I've no doubt this type of armour was pretty good for close combat and stopping most arrows, but what about firearms ? After all, "Western" armourers who worked with one-piece monolith steel cuirasses still had to make those double thickness to accomplish serviceable levels of bulletproofing, which in turn made them pretty heavy for their coverage and eventually brought about the virtual abandonement of metal armour aside from helmets and cuirasses due to logistical reasons.

In other words, it would seem to me the Husaria armour was somewhat lacking when it came to stopping those nasty lead balls compared to their Western opposite numbers, although the savings in weight presumably made them even faster moving.

Incidentally, I recently got my mitts on the Osprey books covering the Polish armies of the period under discussion. The glossary in the second one has the following entry:
Koncerz, Estoc, Tuck or Panzerstecher: long sword carried on horse. The 'Hungarian' version was often triangular or square in section, the 'Turkish' version often double-edged.The good old estoc anti-armour thrusting sword, then, nothing terribly special; the design was used by TYW cavalry too, at least if Ofredsår is to be believed (and I don't see why not).

[Asmodai]

Hmm, firearms isnt a problem for any horseman in XVII century.

You know, personal firearms divide to carbines and muskets. Muskets are similar to modern shotguns,ie they have not rifled barrels. So, you may load the musket with huge, lead ball but the accuracy on that shot in long range will be very low.
Carbines have rifled barrles, so long range shots have greater chance to hit, but ammo tends to be small in calibre.
In the case of muskets from XVII, the most effective distance to them was about 50m. And that is true. I shot form modern replica of XVII musket, and we shot to big barn, distant about 100meters. We MISSED the barn completely, hitting tree instead. Tree was positioned on the left side of the barn, and the distance between the barn and unfortunate tree was about 25-30 meters. And we used forks and we think, that we cannot miss that big and stable object. Going further we shooted from modern hunting rifle(i dont remember the mark), targeting the front doors of the barn. We managed to hit that door, near lock.
So, rifled barrel weapon is definitely more accurate. I cannot imagine a shot to moving target, like charging hussar from musket.

And my knowledge about hussar armour. It was form of plate armour, not lamellar armour. Lamellar armours were build from small metal strips or plates, and it rather refers to scale mail armour, known in Polish armies. Scale mail (called Karacena in Poland) was rather expensive form of protection, used by rich commanders.

Hussar armour consisted of open helmet with cheek protection(similar in look to pappenheimers), we called that helm szyszak, full plate cuirass with fould or tassets, gorget, pauldrons, full couters and greaves. That pieces are rather similar to full plate harness, rather than lamellar type ones. And many warriors used only few pieces of that armour. For egs, couters were changed to vambraces only, pauldrons were often discarded, graves also. And long mail skirts were used under cuirass, lond sleeves protecting whole arm, and when used with vambraces, that pervectly protected arm from melee hits. In fact, i seened many forms of protection used by hussars.

Against firepower weapon, armour cannot protect properly, but i think, that was not his role. Plate armour protected warrior from bow fire and melee weapon, like turkish or tatar sabres. So my theory is that hussar armour protected polish warrior after initial charge.

[cegorach]

@Asmodai

I agree about the horses - the claimes that a certain Polish breed existed are too much, but still it was something quite unique, because the had the best 'proportions' i.e. the combination of weight, size, stamina reached the very peak with those horses - no wonder they were so expensive.

Another interesting thing is that they were wearing eastern saddles much more effective when it comes to saving horse's energy. The same saddles, and similar steeds were used by Polish reiters or rather cuirassiers in early XVIIth century ( later they lost all armour and became the standard reiter of this period) who often were Husaria, but without lance or koncerz. These cuirassiers were able to caracole if necessary - another proof how universal cavalry Husaria was.
It was said that " A Hussar without lance is a cuirassier, without armour he is Kozak i.e. light cavalrymen" The only things they kept all the time were steeds, pistols and sabres.


The wings - the never were compulsory, and sometimes were not used at all. But as the visable (together with lance, koncerz and pennants and skins) mark of Husaria they were used most of the time - the statement is supported by the majority of sources I have read about Husaria - and I have read almost everything written about this cavalry in Polish or English.:2thumbsup:

So I would support the opinion that they were used much more often than they were not - true that from time to time some opinions appear that it was only for show, parades etc. but it is mostly done by historians who want to become famous very quickly and what can be more visable than undermining one of the 'icons' of the Polish military history ? :laugh4:

Pospolite ruszenie - true a rubble, still it was more a territorial militia than anything else. Similar formations existed in other states as well - sometimes completely medieval in style - in Russia, Turkey, but also in Portugal, France or... Sweden. They were usually equally 'effective'. :laugh4:

BTW Are you playing with Dark Angels still ? I do play WH40k and WHB myself.

@Watchman

Very good you have got the books, they are very good, only few mistakes I would see as of any significance, but nothing terribly important.
I would recommend the other books of the same writer Richard Brzezinski - Lutzen 1632 and the armiy of Gustavus Adolphus - very well supported by sources and sometimes challenging the common ideas especially about the famous caracole and its 'abandoning' by G.Adolphus armies.
The book about Husaria is released in June - same author and Iam impatient to get it.


-The armour was never designed to resist bullets it was seen that is is quite useless, especially considering the terribly bad accuracy of firearms at that time.
It was designed to be light and flexible and still very efficient in close combat - and it really was.
It was slightly heavier after the battle at Mewe in 1626, but not much - the designed slightly changed to give some more protection against bullets, but still it ws more psychological than real - the armour hardly could be really bullet-proof, besides it couldn't protect the horse anyway...

The armout weighted around 15-16 kilograms - only 6-8 lighter than the armour of Pancerni ( lighter one) cavalry whichwas considered to be light.
The hussars got this way the necesary speed to fight even in extreme situations like Sobieski's czambul raid i 1672 (?) or 1673 where his army travelled through 350-380 kilometer distance (straight line, so more in reality) during 2 weeks long raid fighting one or more battles every day, crossing autumn rivers and mud - definetely one of the best cavalry actions in military history.

-Koncerz - exactly nothing special in design or use, although it was Husaria who made the greatest use of this weapon, I dare say - it could be compared with Ironside-like cavalry using 2 meter lances in dense knee-to-knee formations - together with pistols it made an impressive impact.
But required different skills, exactly like XVIII-XIXth century cavalry lance.

Regards Cegorach :book:

[Asmodai]

[QUOTE=cegorach1]
The wings - the never were compulsory, and sometimes were not used at all. But as the visable (together with lance, koncerz and pennants and skins) mark of Husaria they were used most of the time - the statement is supported by the majority of sources I have read about Husaria - and I have read almost everything written about this cavalry in Polish or English.:2thumbsup:

So I would support the opinion that they were used much more often than they were not - true that from time to time some opinions appear that it was only for show, parades etc. but it is mostly done by historians who want to become famous very quickly and what can be more visable than undermining one of the 'icons' of the Polish military history ? :laugh4:

BTW Are you playing with Dark Angels still ? I do play WH40k and WHB myself.[QUOTE]

Yes, i still playing WHB....once for a year recently, but marriage change some things completely.

Thanks for that wings. So, they were used and i may throw that fantasies about parade only wings to garbage heap?

[cegorach]

Yes, you can. :book:

[Watchman]

Hmm, firearms isnt a problem for any horseman in XVII century....wut?
Are you claiming that massed volleys from closely ordered musketeers, with balls able to punch through the best armour in use from ten meters, delivered against incoming cavalry in close-combat order preferably from close by with the front three ranks firing simultaneously, were "not a problem" for 1600s cavalry ?
:inquisitive:
R-i-i-i-i-ght. I guess they wore all that heavy, expensive armour just for fun then. Gotta wonder at all the occasions of cavalry attacks being checked by sheer overwhelming fire too - maybe the gunners were really foul-mouthed, and managed to see off the charging horsemen with sufficiently rude talk...?

Historical evidence, alas, calls the aforequoted line total bollocks.

As I often find myself pointing out, 1600s munitions-grade cavalry breastplates and helmets were expected to be able to stop pistol bullets from five paces and standard-sized musket balls from about ten. The dents left by the "proofing" shots at the factory had been considered a proof of quality since around the Renaissance already.

The back plates, and the limb armour worn by cuirassieurs and other heavier armoured men, was only half the thickness of the helmet and front plate in order to save weight.

The horses seem to have been considered quite secondary, but then in spite of their high price warhorses have had a tendency to be considered far more expendable than their riders throughout history anyway; barding appears to have been used mostly as a response to excessive threat of missile fire, be it from bows or crossbows, although it had its uses in close combat. This detail actually puzzles me to a considerable degree - surely, given that it is presumably a lot easier to kill an unarmoured horse than an armoured rider, it would make sense to armour the mounts (if only with light leather or fabric bards) if at all possible ? Yet this seems to have been fairly rarely done, even by warrior elites who could certainly have afforded it and rode horses capable of carrying such gear, and apparently did not excessively detract from their battlefield performance in comparision. Even against massed firearms giving only the rider decent defenses - say, the Napoleonic steel breastplates and helmets reintroduced by Frederic the Great - seems to have considerably improved cavalry survivability and hence ability to press home a charge through the inevitable point-blank salvoes infantry as a rule welcomed them with.

Maybe horses, being such big animals, just don't die as easily or something. I don't know, but would certainly like to.


And my knowledge about hussar armour. It was form of plate armour, not lamellar armour. Lamellar armours were build from small metal strips or plates, and it rather refers to scale mail armour, known in Polish armies. Scale mail (called Karacena in Poland) was rather expensive form of protection, used by rich commanders.I said laminate, not lamellar. Pay attention. The two are quite different; the ancient Roman lorica segmentata is a classic example of laminated (sometimes called "banded") armour; another would be the flexible upper leg defenses used by heavily armoured cavalry of the Early Modern period. Lamellar is made out of small rectangular vertical strips fastened to each other and sometimes some kind of backing with lacing and/or riveting. Overlaps normally upwards. Scale is still different, made up of (usually) roughly triangular metal scales riveted to a backing from their upper edges, overlapping downwards, with the lower end normally hanging free. "Locked" scale, which has the lower edges also riveted, did exist, but was rarely used due to the simple fact it was as rigid as monolithic armour without the same degree of protection. AFAIK most known examples come from later-period Roman cavalry, amongst whom they were apparently used as highly impressive looking alternatives to standard scale.

The Polish karacena was by all accounts an essentially decorative type of comparatively minimal protective value against the weaponry of the era (especially in regards to its enormous price), largely inspired by the romantic Sarmatian mythology of the period and primarily worn to show off rather than for any practical benefit. Although I'd imagine it still stopped swords pretty well, as all metal armour is wont to.

Somewhat curiously between 15 and 20 kilos is what I've seen the weight of a standard proofed-front-plate-and-helm-plus-weaker-backplate mid-late 1600s cavalry set always quoted as. This would seem to reflect rather badly on the laminate corselets of the husaria, which were around as heavy but apparently not bulletproof to nearly the same degree. Mail shirts incidentally apparently weigh about the same on the average.

***

Frankly, it increasingly seems to me the husaria were the final evolutionary developement of one branch of the medieval couched-lance concept, the other being the massively armoured knight on a huge barded horse that had been phased out in the West by the beginning of the 17th century. The Polish chivalry appear to have gone the opposite way, greatly lightening their harness and virtually abandoning barding in favor of immense speed and maneuverability, making up for the lost "weight" of the charge with sheer speed and an innovative developement of the lance. I know the Polish knights who fought the Teutonic Order at Tannenberg at the dawn of the 15th century were still armed almost identically to their opponents, so the divergence obviously happened sometime in the two centuries after that. The pesky steppe nomads, fighting whom required much more mobility and maneuverability than raw weight of metal, would be my educated guess for the reason.

Obviously, the husaria honed their particular brand of shock cavalry warfare to near perfection, for it kept them going several centuries and was still conditionally useful when the rules of the game were suddenly changed.

Success, however, has an unpleasant tendency to become a bit of a trap. I'm under the very strong impression the developements of the Thirty Years' War, which in many ways revolutionized warfare both tactically and strategically, pulled the mat from under their feet. Even a cursory look at the set-piece battles of the Polish campaign of Carolus X make it clear the husaria could no longer reliably cut it against the fully mature pike-and-shot tactics of their opponents; their edge had been severely dulled. The same had happened to the English and their until then near-unbeatable longbow-based tactics towards the end of the Hundred Years' War when the French suddenly changed the rules of the game. Moreover, and probably much more seriously, it seems that the Polish system of adminstration and raising troops simply wasn't up to the demands of the new mass warfare. This probably had rather a lot to do with the inability of the monarchy to assert its authority over the warrior nobility, which fatally hampered the realm's ability to aggregate and deploy resources to meet the imposing demands of the new paradigm.

[KrooK]

Musketeers were not dangerous for most cavs before 1600. Muskets were good against infatry, who was staying at one place, but not against fast cavarly who was riding on your flank. Imagine you are carrying 15 kilos and you have to take it, aim and wait until enemy come- your hands will get tired into max 20 seconds and you will be unable to aim.
In one charge died not more than 5 -10 soldiers from regiment (about 200). Later after reforms in swedish army (all soldiers shoot same time) loses were bigger - about 20 soldiers. Furthermore sometimes husaria used Tatars tactic - they could hide behind horse's back.

Addind something to husaria's horses, they were very expensive (because superb trained). Most historicals in Poland describing battle of Kircholm add horse casualties (400 !!!) for human casualties.

[Watchman]

To engage enemy in close combat, cavalry - like everyone else - has to approach them straight on. And you know when musketeers were supposed to let go the one salvo they had time for before the horses got close ? Virtual point-blank range, ten meters or so. Given that shock cavalry almost by definition has to come in with closed ranks, and the musketeers are letting go normally from even closer order with multiple ranks, if the gunners are so much as pointing their weapons in the roughly right direction they're more likely than not to hit something.

More importantly, though, the sheer psychological impact of such close-range blast with all the associated fire and smoke, and men and horses dying of the balls, has a curious tendency to break the nerve of the attackers and make them veer away before contact.

Since the musketeers could then also happiky shoot at the retreating backs of the horsemen, whether they were able to break up the charge or not (or at least sufficiently weaken it that their pikemen or cavalry escort - the Swedes at least had a habit of giving cavalry squadrons "sleeves" of musketeers - could see it off) was the important thing.

To be blunt, the rest of the post contains so much outright fallacies it's giving me a headache. I'll sort them out on general principles.

Muskets were good against infatry, who was staying at one place, but not against fast cavarly who was riding on your flank.Except infantry worth anything had stopped being static by Late Middle Ages. And even fast cavalry is still a formation of men and horses - unless it's in very loose skirmish order, simply sending projectiles into the general area it occupies will probably hit something. Massed battlefield archery wasn't a particularly more exact science either.

Besides, there were occasions when cavalry for one reason or another found themselves forced to stay still, or at least in one place, while under sustained fire from musketeers or other missile troops. Terrain, sudden change in tactical situation or tactical necessity, or sheer confusion of formation - besides the oft-present "wall" of pikemen - ware all possible reasons why the musketeers could blast away to their heart's content.


Imagine you are carrying 15 kilos and you have to take it, aim and wait until enemy come- your hands will get tired into max 20 seconds and you will be unable to aim. Heavy muskets were used with musket-rests. And it's not like you need to aim too much anyway when firing a salvo into a virtually solid wall of approaching horsemen at a close range...

As for the Polish horses, they were by all accounts formidable beasts indeed and of considerable military value - so considerable, in fact, I've read their export sale was bluntly forbidden by law.

[Asmodai]

If you are trying to stop cavalry charge, shooting at them at point blank, you actually loosing any psychological factor caused by losses. Even wiping out first rank isnt enough to stop the rest of advancing cavalrymen, cos they know, that reloading muskets takes longer that their charge. So, the best thing to do, was to charge, not withdraw.

Read some books about hussaria battles. They usualy loosed few to several men during charge. Later, on Tczew. they loosed more, but still not enough to stop them.

[cegorach]

@Asmodai

This time I would agree with Watchman, at least to some degree - the firepower could stop the charge, especially it there were THREE massive volleys - 1 from light cannons and two of massed musketeer ranks, but still even G.Adophus never relied on this alone - he used swine's feathers, terrain difficult to use by cavalry ( at Mewe/Gniew for example there is damn big 4meters or even 8 meters high dam in front of his positions, besides Swedes sent their reiters to stop the Polish Husaria when they received all this, so it was possible, but hard.

@Watchman

I wish I had more time now to post some images and maps ( I will do it later), but Husaria evolved from light balcan Rac/Huszarok/Gusar/Stradiotti (all where so similar that they were from the same 'family' of cavalry) and used heavier armour because of varied tasks they were supposed to do on a battlefield..
Heavy armoured knights died out in the entire region faster than in western europe.
New hussars were essentially medium cavalry fullfilling varied tasks and fighting different enemies and they later were used to create light hussars and lancers seen for example during Napoleonic Era.

The weight of Husaria armour includes helmet, karwasz armguards i.e. every piece of armour used by Husaria - it is 16 kilograms, rarely more, which I am sure is much less than three-quarter armour or similar.

Karl X Gustav's experiences in Poland should be seen as fighting an army during a reorganisation with very few Husaria in particular ( no more than 1500 - the lowest number in History).

I will post more later.

Regards Cegorac:2thumbsup:

[Watchman]

Properly bulletproof three-quarters armour (I usually call it "cuirassieur armour" when discussing the Early Modern period, as that's what the troops who used it were called) was nastily heavy. Standard full harness weighed over thirty kilos, and some extra-strong ones known as much as forty (although killing a man in one of those without a cannon did also become quite challenging...). It had largely been abandoned by the end of the Thirty Years' War save for officers and rare heavy units (some were still deployed during the English Civil Wars), as it was a logistical pain in the ass. The helmet and breastplate travelled easily enough on the trooper, but the limb armour pretty much had to be carried in the baggage which duly robbed the horsemen much of their strategic mobility. Basically, it was found out armies spent so much more time marching around that fighting, and that mobility was such an important asset for the cavalry, that the heavy and problematic cuirassieur armour simply wasn't worth it.

Ergo, a simple bulletproof corselet (about 15kg) plus helmet (2-3kg) became the standard for armoured cavalry; the Swedes, unable to afford large formations of cuirassieurs (the few they had were apparently mainly recruited from the Teutonic Knights of Swedish-held Baltic regions), had been using that since their entry into the TYW, and it had been the norm for the "harquebusieur" fire-support cavalry who "shot in" the cuirassieur charges.

Curious detail: the tactic of pistolade, discharging wheellock pistols at short range and following through with sword, had been already used with considerable success by the heavy cavalry of the future King Henry IV against fully armoured lancers in the late stages of the French religious civil wars. Also, during Spain's drawn-out and frustrating Netherlands war it was noted the mercenary German Reiters (who'd be called cuirassieurs by TYW terminology) with their caracole-style skirmish tactics tended to get swept away by the somewhat lighter armoured English demi-lancers ("dami" from their "half" armour - full body and arms defenses, but only long leather boots on the legs).

[Asmodai]

Hmm, i`d never seen bulletproof armour in XVII century. I know(from experience) that hitting anyone from musket was hard thing, but when the bullet hits, there is no excuses.
Average musket calibre is about 20-30mm, and bullet is very similar to breneka bullet from modern shotguns. So, when the bullet hits, he can penetrate any armour. Furthermore, even, when when not, force of impact will throw horseman from the saddle, practicaly eliminating him from the battle.
Modern kevlar armours have similar problems with brenekas. Even, when bullet cannot penetrate armour, it is almoust sure, that trooper will be knoked down unconcious for a while.

Also, we discuss about hussaria, and hussaria armour. And that armour certainly was not a three-quarter armour, and was not bulletproof either.

[cegorach]

I have checked my sources and Husaria armour wasn't so heavy as I have written.
On average it was around 12,5 kilograms ( everything included): armour from early XVIIth was lighter than 12,1 ( the only remaining example weights 12,1, but it includes some weird, never used leg armour), armour from early XVIIIth was exactly 12,5 kilograms. Only around 1630 it was heavier ( a kind of response to more massive firepower of the Swedish army - it was during the preparations for the planned war against Sweden 1635) - but examples above 15-16 kilograms are something very rare.
Karacena is a different thing, but it was almost purely decorative and was rather rarely used, most often against Turks who didn't possess to massive firepower.

@Watchman

Cavalry charging with pistols used at point blank range was also used by Hugenots they were called Millers, in addition as far as I can tell Danish elite cavalry was using similar tactics in 1560-70s, I guess there are even more examples.

Regards Cegorach :book:

[Asmodai]

Yep, i agree with the weight of the armour. I have elements(cuirass, partial leg protection, pauldrons, cuises, gauntlets and salade helmet) of gothic armour in home(i`m recreating XV century mercenary), and my armour is much lighter than 16kg.I often wear mail shirt under cuirass, so overall it may weight more than 16kg. But i think, that direct hit from any blackpowder weapon will make short work with all that metal stuff on me.
Armours are made of various quality, and when we see some old stuff from the past, almost for sure, that thing was never used in battles. Ceremonial or parade things were much heavier and much bulkier than ordinary things, but never used in battles, never worn off, so they are in shape today. We can talk about quality of battle made equipment, when we make that stuff, using the same(or similar at least) manufacturing process.

[Watchman]

1600s cavalry-standard breast- and backplate alone weigh some 15kg. About two-thirds of that would be the front plate, which was made double the normal thickness (3-4mm to the usual 1-2mm) to resist bullets.

The things were required to pass a fairly standard set of "proofing" tests (normal was standard musket from about 10m and pistol from 5, ditto for the helmet) already at the factory before purchasing agents would even bother getting interested. The resulting dent was considered a certificate of quality. Pretty old practice that, actually - armour was being similarly tested for "proof" already against crossbows back in the Middle Ages around some parts, I've read.

The poor bloody infantry was stuck with standard-thickness cuirasses as they had to walk around the things. Expedieency over survivability there, but then the pikemen (who were the only footsloggers who got more than a helmet) were primarily concerned with other pikemen and cavalry in close combat anyway; their musketeer buddies dealt with the others.

In any case, the stuff worked. Nobody would've bothered with the heavy things otherwise, and these were standard issue to line cavalry. Large-diameter lead balls at comparatively low speeds aren't the exactly best thing around for punching through thick tempered-steel plates at uncooperative angles, you know.

I've read of particularly thick and strong "cuirassieur" suits (ie. "three-quarter" armour) made to order for particularly rich and important buggers. Those things total like over forty kilos (standard cuirassieur harness was about 30), but then they're also of the calibre like the one in that English Civil War case where an "Ironside" found out a point-blank pistol shot to the side of a cuirassieur's helmet just stunned the bugger...


Cavalry charging with pistols used at point blank range was also used by HugenotsUh... the future King Henry IV was a Huguenot, originally. Still by that point too, I think - it was his boys. He turned to Catholicism a while alter though - being attributed the famous quote "Paris is always worth one Mass" on the occasion.

Them French religious wars were one tangled mess, I'll say that much however.

[cegorach]

The only way the Polish football team can win in Germany

https://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b356/cegorach/img500.jpg

They have Husaria on their T-shirts - terrible...:inquisitive: