The First Battle of Adana, 1188
“How long has it been since we last fought a battle, Ernst?” Henry wondered. Ernst, his most devoted guard, looked back impassively, having long ago learnt not to interrupt the Kaiser’s soliloquies.
“How many years? Ah, my brain hurts even trying to think on that. What was our last battle, Ernst?”
Ernst watched the Kaiser stride around the tent, Henry’s agitation and excitement clear to behold.
“I remember now - it was against the French while Manfred was still Chancellor, just after poor Sigismund fell. What has become of Swabia now? It has lost its way, and the French still menace us.”
A fellow Swabian, Ernst looked down dolefully.
“But now, at last, we are back. And what a battle. Dusan reckons there are 1500 of the Mohammedans.”
“Am I too eager to be back on the field of battle? Hans and Dietrich seem to think so. Damn, I am sad to see Otto’s gone. It’s not good to go into battle with reluctant warriors. Still, Hans and Dietrich surely understand that this battle, at least must be fought?”
Henry looked carefully at Ernst:
“You haven’t got much to say for yourself, have you?”
Ernest was about to respond to the Kaiser, when he heard footsteps approach and turned round to see Dusan Kolar stride into the tent, his black cloak swirling.
“Still talking to your damned dog, Kaiser” said Dusan, as he scratched Ernst’s ears and the dog thumped his tail from side to side excitedly. “Some people would say you’re going mad. Gone to the dogs, even.”
The Kaiser looked irritatedly at his presumptious advisor, who was crouched happily petting Ernst, Henry’s faithful guard dog.
“Come, Kaiser, you must put on your cloak - we’ve a journey to make. The Egyptian General, Mahmoud Ahmad, has requested a parley.
*****
Henry looked at the commanding young figure in front of him. Mahmoud Ahmad was only 33, but he spoke with calm authority and moved with grace.
“Great Kaiser, it is truly an honour to meet you. I am grateful for you agreeing to talk.”
Why the hell am I talking? Kaiser wondered to himself. This is to be a battle, not a breakfast! What was Kolar thinking? Henry tried to compose himself and said reservedly:
“Do not mention it, General. What was it you wanted to discuss?”
Mahmoud waved to his servants to bring Henry a small pot of coffee. The Kaiser tasted the drink cautiously, finding the sober, bitter beverage much more suitable for the time before battle than the wine, beer and spirits routinely consumed by the Germans. When the Kaiser had sipped from his cup, Mahmoud continued calmly.
“Kaiser, as I believe you know, my orders are to march on Constantinople. While our countries may now be at war, I have no intention to strike at you. I respect your strength and that of your warriors. If we fight today, the losses may be so great I may arrive at Constantinople with too few men to accomplish my mission. Or I may not arrive at all.”
Henry admired the young men’s candour and so returned it.
“General, you are a good and loyal soldier. There are good and loyal generals in my camp who think of my situation, as you think of yours.”
Mahmoud’s eyes widened slightly:
“Then Kaiser, take your army and pass by. No one need die this day.”
Henry drained his cup, as the last bitter drop of coffee fell, it only added to the empty feeling inside the Kaiser and he shook his head, sadly.
“I am sorry, General. It is impossible. Constantinople is the capitol of my allies and I am honour bound to assist them.”
Mahmoud looked down, and nodded.
“I understand the calls of duty and friendship, Kaiser. And, of course, I am not surprised. You have already stopped one of our armies heading for Constantinople, perhaps I was foolish to think you would not do so again.”
The Egyptian general looked up and narrowed his eyes:
“But there is one thing, I ask of you, man to man. When this day is over, whichever way Allah wills it, let is not end the way of the last battle of our peoples. Let us treat each other’s men with the respect we two generals have shown each other today.”
Henry stared into the young generals’ eyes. He knows. He knows he is outclassed. He has not called me here to avoid battle. He has brought me here to plead for the lives of his men. Henry found himself admiring again the composed young Egyptian facing him.
“General, you are brave and honourable man. You have my word.”
As the Kaiser left the Egyptian camp, he cursed Dusan Kolar.
“What the hell were you doing, bringing me here? We are here to kill these people, not drink coffee with them!”
Dusan Kolar smiled quietly. “You may have been drinking, Sire, I have not. Look around you. Know your enemy.”
Damn it, thought Henry: Kolar’s made me look like an idiot again! Here we are, in the heart of the enemy camp before battle, seeing their every regiment, able to size up the opposition. This kind of intelligence is invaluable! Henry looked around at the seething mass of enemy soldiers readying themselves for war. Around General Ahmad’s tent, the bodyguards seemed covered in very heavy armour - even their horses were protected from head to toe by the heaviest coats of armour. Henry could even see catapults and trebuchets towering over the Egyptian tents. Henry noted all this with admiration, but then his eyes travelled further afield. As he travelled out of the camp, most of the Egyptian soldiers around seemed ill equipped, undrilled but with eyes that burned with a passion: young excitable Mutatawwi’a and fanatical Ghazis, grey haired Sudanese warriors and robed Bedouin cavalry. Many of the enemy were chanting or praying. In their devotion, Henry thought sadly, these are Manfred’s children, born under a different sky. The abundance of cloth and bronzed flesh stayed in Henry’s mind as he returned to his camp, to be greeted by serried ranks of heavily armoured knights. This was not going to be a battle, it was going to be a slaughter.
*****
“Now, Dietrich, I want you up on the heights on my right. Take the pavisse crossbowmen. We can’t allow the enemy to gain that ground. I can spare you a regiment of dismounted knights and one of spearmen, and you can take Jonas too.”
Dietrich nodded. Henry embraced the old warhorse. No further instructions were necessary. Dietrich could be trusted to lead the right division as the situation dictated.
“Hans, you will be on the left flank, next to me. The Teutons will be on my right. The rest of the infantry will be formed up in column next to the spur under Dietrich’s heights. Put the crossbow militia in front, then the armoured sergeants, followed by the knights. The pilgrims can bring up the rear. Their numbers can add to an impression of strength, but I don’t want them anywhere near the enemy.”
Why do I want Hans so close to me? Henry wondered. Is it so I can protect him from danger? Or because I don’t trust him not to go charging off on his own?
“We will move the line forward until we are on the crest of the spur to the right, then we will take it from there.”
Henry could see Dietrich looking at him quizzically. Yes, not much of a plan, I know, God damn it, Henry thought in a fluster. But we will improvise.
Slowly, the German line shuffled forward, its deliberate step contrasting with the fleeting grace of a regiment of mercenary Turcopoles, who raced towards the Germans’ right. All four regiments of German crossbows targeted the horse archers, but their speed seemed to protect them from damage. In a flash, they were almost upon the crossbow militia, who ran backwards in disorder.
From the heights above, Duke Dietrich watched the turcopoles in frustration. His pavisse crossbowmen seemed to be making no impression on the horse archers. But then the old Duke saw the enemy begin using a Cantabrian circle to protect themselves against missile fire.
“Jonas!” Dietrich roared. “Now we have them! Charge those heathen dogs!”
In the centre of the German line, Henry’s attention had been fixed on the flamboyant turcopoles and only belatedly did he see a regiment of Egyptian archers coming racing forwards. Astonished by their audacity, Henry ordered his own escort to drive them off. Dusan Kolar looked at the Kaiser in incomprehension - he was abandoning command of the army now, before the battle had even started?
The charge was badly botched - the Kaiser’s escort was on the right flank of the Egyptian archers and was not properly aligned for a charge. Moreover, the Egyptians were remarkably fleet footed, reaching the safety of their lines before the Kaiser’s men had come into contact. The Kaiser’s exhilaration turned to anxiety as in front of him loomed a fast moving mass of over a thousand Egyptian infantry.
“Pull back! Pull back!” he screamed, but in the roar of battle, it was hard for his frantic voice to reach the helmeted ears of his bodyguard.
Over on the left of the German line, Hans had been left to face the second mercenary Turcopole regiment. All the crossbowmen were far away on the right or in the centre right of the line, so Hans and his slow moving escort were powerless against the fleet footed horse archers. Hans watched his father’s escort wheeling right to chase the Egyptian archers. He watched the arrows of the Turcopoles thud into the heavy armour of his men. The extra padding and horse armour would protect them for a while, but the young man was damned if he was going to let the enemy come up to his nose and start shooting. Hans ordered a charge to drive off the Turcopoles.
Hans’s charge was, as he knew, an exercise in futility. The greater speed of the Turcopoles meant they could easily outpace their pursuers, and their skill with the bow meant that even flight did not put an end to the barrage they were able to lay on Hans’ men. However, the pursuit did put Hans behind the main enemy lines and so he was able to break off, about turn and crash into the enemy infantry approaching the German centre.
In the centre of the battle, Henry had managed to extricate his bodyguard from the main body of the jihad with the loss of only one knight. But the situation was grim. General Ahmad clearly had no intention of leaving his men standing around and being shot down by the German crossbow bolts. His army was moving en masse towards the spur on the centre right on the German lines. There would be no time to for a missile duel. Henry began to realise with alarm how narrow his front line was - formed in a column, two regiments abreast. Hastily, he ordered the two regiments of dismounted knights to move alongside the two regiments of armoured spearmen. Even then, his frontage was less than half that of the enemy. With Hans gone from his left, his own escort in disorder, all that remained to hold his flank was a fine regiment of Teutonic knights. Reluctantly, Henry realised he had no choice but to order these sixty elite warriors forward, in a frontal attack on the central enemy mass of over a thousand fanatical warriors.
When he gathered his own escort together, Henry ordered it back into the central melee. There was nothing for it now, but hard fighting: German iron against Egyptian cloth.
On the right, from above the heights, Duke Dietrich watched the chaotic battle that had erupted in the centre of the German lines. His left division was about a third of the Reich’s forces, but its deployment had left it out of touch with the main conflagration.
Dietrich roared at the men around him:
“Down and at them, men! The Kaiser needs us! Forward, for God’s sake! I have promised him my support! Would you make me a liar?”
Over on the German left, the Turcopoles who had been harassing Hans observed his escort, locked in battle with the Egyptian infantry and decided to strike at their exposed rears. Hans, however, welcomed this chance to come to grips with those who had earlier been his tormentors and managed to successfully extricate his escort to face the enemy cavalry.
Amidst the chaos of battle, Henry wondered if he had forgotten something. Hacking through the mass of Egyptian infantry was one thing, but surely there was more to it than this? And then he remembered - the heavily armoured men who had guarded General Ahmad. Come to think of it, where was Ahmad himself? Dusan Kolar seemed to read his Master’s mind and he pointed over to the centre left of the line. There, Henry could just make our a compact body of enemy horsemen emerging out of the mass of Egyptians.
With alarm, Henry realised that his left flank was exposed. Hans was alone on the far left, now surrounded by Turcopoles and ghazis. Closer in the regiment of Teutons was holding back the tide of the enemy infantry but it could not endure forever. Already, the furthest left regiment of dismounted knights had been destroyed in the central melee, a dozen broken survivors running to the rear. General Ahmad was leading his heavily armoured, veteran band of cavalry straight to the weakest point of the German line.
“Crossbows - shoot them down! Escort - about left!” shouted Henry, taking his escort around to meet the enemy general “With me, men, with me! Ride! Ride!”
Things were going better on the German right, as Dietrich’s cavalry cut its way deep into the flank of the Egyptian mass, reaching its war machines.
The tide was beginning to turn. As Henry’s escort made their appearance on the centre left of the German lines, entire Egyptian regiments started to break. Barefoot warriors from Sudan, some old men with grey hair - others, slim boys - could not stand before the heavy horse and iron of the elite German knights.
On the extreme left, Hans and his men had managed to see off the Turcopoles and were making short work of the Ghazis who stubbornly held on.
Gradually, the Kaiser’s escort cut its way through the Egyptian lines until it was able to reach General Ahmad and his bodyguard. Although by convention it was a great honour to battle your opponent, hand to hand, Henry was rather glad that he was not the one to slay his honourable young opponent.
With the death of their general, the will of the Egypt army began to sap. Henry led his men forward into the central mass of the enemy jihad, determined to break any regiments that resisted.
“Forward! Forward! They won’t stand!” shouted Henry. “Bring forward the pilgrims too, come on! Don’t let them get away!”
*****
After the battle, Dusan Kolar approached the Kaiser:
“Sire, about the prisoners. We have nearly 500 of them. What do you want done with them?”
Henry looked at Dusan wearily. Germany had lost over two hundred men, but numbers did not tell the full story. The quality of the men the Reich had lost was what mattered. Over 100 dismounted feudal knights and an entire regiment of Teutons. Dietrich would doubtless advise the Egyptians all be executed, as the Duke had done at Constantinople. There was a certain logic in that. Could the Reich afford to face these men again? To see another two hundred German knights slaughtered by waves of unarmoured fanatics? But no, there had been enough killing today. Ordering an execution was inconceivable. In his youth, the Kaiser might have released the prisoners, but that option was scarcely worth contemplating. The others on the Crusader Council would not understand. Henry looked back at Dusan, helplessly:
“What am I to do?”
Dusan stared at his master, a man physically and emotionally drained by the day’s battle. The pagan magician’s eyes sparkled and he said light-heartedly:
“Let God decide. Offer them for ransom. If God wills it, they will be free. If not,…”
Henry nodded heavily, so be it. Nearly 500 prisoners - what would such men be worth, Henry mused? When he later heard it was a scant four florins per man, the Kaiser was surprised at the low value of a man’s life. But that idle thought was of little consequence compared to the great relief the Kaiser felt at being able to honour his promise to the late Mahmoud Ahmad.
Re: Battle reports thread - King of the Romans PBM
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