Andreas raced to Antioch as soon as he got the message from Viceroy Matthias. Apparently the Greeks had moved their major armies away from Antioch, to the east. Whether it was cowardice in the face of the Viceroy's victory, or if they had not yet received news of the battle and assumed their man had won, making them needed more against the Turks, Andreas did not know. Whatever the reason, they had left the city in the hands of a single unit of Vardaratoi, although an elite one.
Since the news of a large army marching north might bring the Greeks back before he could reach Antioch, Andreas decided to take only a small force, including his bodyguard, a slightly depleted unit of spearmen, and the cannons needed to takeou he city walls. It was a risky move but a needed one, and Andreas was driven to it partly by guilt over not contributing to Outremer's defense to the extent he ad wanted. He was able to reach Antioch before any Greek scouts spotted his force, and assaulted it immediately.
The cannon crews, experienced from their battles alongside Matthias, took down several sections of the wall in minutes.
Oddly, the Byzantine cavalry did not have the tower walls manned to shoot at Andreas' men, and did not come to block entry into the city. Perhaps the Greek captain felt that with only one unit of men and several breeches in the wall, trying to plug one would only result in his being surrounded, or worse yet in cannon bombardments of hs position. Encouraged, Andreas ordered his spearmen to aim for the leftmost breech and his own bodyguard into the rightmost one.
His men's entry into the city seemed to jolt the Greeks from their stupor, and they came forward to shoot at the German spearmen. Andreas ordered he spearmen to hold their position. The Vardaratoi had stopped next to an open street on one side, and he hoped to take his guard around and strike them from two spots.
Although his spearmen took some losses from the expert horsearchers, Andreas' plan worked. Andreas' guard slammed into the flank of the Greeks, splitting their forces in two. This was the signal for the spearmen to charge, and half the Greek forces were taken out in detail, including the enemy captain.
Their captain defeated, the Greeks were allowd to surrender, and Andreas occupied the town peacefully. Andreas was treated to throngs of rejoicing citizens. It would seem that the Greek extermination of the great city some years earlier had increased support for the Reich. The local merchants event donated over 1,000 florins from their coffers to help repair the damaged buildings in the town. It would take time to repair the city, and rebuild the old church, but in regaining its capital Outremer had finally begun to go on the offensive.
Re: Battle reports thread - King of the Romans PBM
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