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What is the most numerically surpsing victory in military history?
Originally posted by KrazyHorse
I didn't say that the longbow inflicted most of the casualties, by the way. I would have been very surprised if it did.
It was a skirmishing weapon, but to claim that it was ineffective against armour makes no sense. Otherwise its value as a skirmishing weapon would be nil...
The terrain of course played a part. by protecting his flanks with forests and choosing terrain unsuitable for quick advance Henry took advantage of his superiority in ranged weapons and played the role of defender to the hilt.
But the longbow decided the day. Without it wreaking havoc in French lines the advance would certainly have been less hurried and more orderly and superior numbers would probably have carried the day.
That's exactly what historians now dispute.
The evidence suggests that the archers killed more people as infantry. More French troops were suffocated in the mud than died at English hands.
Steel armour was a new invention at the time of Agincourt. No one disagrees that bodkin arrows could penetrate iron armour (I've seen that and it is impressive). But I've seen people try to penetrate steel armour and it just doesn't work.
Current thinking is that Agincourt was just like a crowd disaster. The mud made it worse, but it was fundamentally a crowd disaster. Computer software that is used to simulate crowd disasters produced exactly that result when it was used to simulate Agincourt.
The point is that the shape of the battlefield precluded an orderly advance, no matter what the rate of closure was. If Henry chose that ground for that reason, then my estimation of him would be more than if he was merely relying on his archers.
Look at the stakes that the English deployed. They were expecting to be closed and deployed the stakes to break up the French front line. If this was intentional it was a superb plan.
Doing physics is what tells me that a razor sharp arrow travelling two or three hundred miles an hour is going to punch holes in whatever possible armour somebody can carry on their back. There's a reason armour disappeared you know...
OK then. Explain the heavily armoured infantry of the Wars of the Roses. If the English knew that the Longbow could penetrate armour, why did they bother having huge phalanxes of plate armoured infantry as the primary shock troops in the WOTR?
The French abandoned their horses after the first try. Not only were the arrows absolutely destroying them, but they were unable to move in the mud (the greatest advantage of cavalry is in the speed and momentum of advance). Now explain to me how arrows bouncing harmlessly off your troops sows confusion. Skirmishing weapons do not rattle troops unless they're dropping some of them (enough to make the rest really nervous).
Again, moving troops forward into a funnel where they have limited mobility is exactly what causes the trouble.
Contrary to popular ideas, English arrows were not very effective against plate armor at the time of Agincourt. Arrows would penetrate the arm and leg armor with a reasonably direct hit from close range, but would be ineffective against the head or body. Reference: Peter N. Jones, "The Metallography and Relative Effectiveness of Arrowheads and Armor During the Middle Ages." Materials Characterization, vol. 29, pp.111-117 (1992). [A periodical published by Elsevier Science Publishing Co., Inc., 655 Avenue of the Americas, New York, NY 10010. Be prepared for some serious metallurgy.]
Does this mean that the English archers were ineffective? Not at all. They were devastating against foot soldiers, and even the knights were at severe risk, as their horses couldn't carry enough armor to protect them at all. Knights were very protective of their horses. See Henry V, Act III, Scene VII, where the French are trading boasts about the battle to come.
The English have an almost worshipful attitude toward the longbow and the yeomen who used it. See, for example, the Song of the Bow, from Arthur Conan Doyle's The White Company.
For some interesting papers on ancient archery, here are some articles from the Journal of the the Society of Archer-Antiquaries
Misconceptions about Plate Armor
The helplessness of an unhorsed knight in plate armor has been vastly exaggerated. A typical suit of Agincourt- era combat plate armor weighs about 30 - 35 kg. This is roughly the same as a modern infantryman's field pack, and it is better balanced. There are descriptions of knights being lifted onto their horses with a block and tackle, but these are either:
Humourous, and usually modern.
Fairly late tourneys, where the armor was specially built for jousting, and had essentially no freedom of movement.
A very old and fat knight. The Duke of York at Agincourt was an example.
Falling off of a horse is nobody's idea of fun. Falling off a horse while wearing armor is probably even less fun (I haven't tried it, and don't intend to.) However, remember that the knight's favorite sport was the tourney, where many of the events (the joust in particular) involved falling off of horses. While there are records of fatalities from knights falling off of their horses in tourneys, the most common cause of death was a splintered lance going through a helm's eye slits.
Mud
The key word for describing the battle of Agincourt is mud. The battlefield was a freshly plowed field, and at the time of the battle, it had been raining continuously for several days. Soon after the battle started, it had thousands of English and French soldiers and horses running through it. Anywhere near the battlefield, the mud was at least ankle deep. Much of the time, it was up to the combatants' knees. Occasionally, it reached their waists. There are descriptions of horses floundering around in mud up to their bellies.
Falling off of a horse in the kind of mud that was at Agincourt was no joke, especially in armor. Indeed, many of the deaths (including that of the Duke of York) were caused by drowning.
The mud was undoubtedly a major factor in the lopsided English victory. The barefoot and in many cases bare legged English foot soldiers were vastly more mobile than the armored French.ÂÂ
Yes. They deployed stakes to break up advance. They chose a narrow field to offset french numerical superiority. They fought the battle on a hell of a wet day.
Those were all pretty standard moves for somebody facing a superior force.
The difference was the longbow. That's why they won that battle and half a dozen others like it against the French over the next 50 years.
By the way, wikipedia claims that the arrows tested in the television program you're referring to were iron tipped. I would be surprised if arrows were still being iron tipped against steel-clad enemies.
I also dispute the weight of the bows used. It took a hell of a lot of muscle to draw a longbow. A hell of a lot more than a modern archer needs to draw a standard bow. A hell of a lot more than you or I could summon up without a lot of exercise. Probably something like 60 lbs or more (compared to a modern bow's 30 or so)...
At dawn, both Henry and d'Albret laid out their forces near their respective camps. To start, the lines were a little over a mile apart. The plain between the armies was a gently rolling field, freshly plowed and planted, about 900 yards wide. It had been raining continuously for two weeks, and the field was a sea of mud.
The French had two very dense lines of armored foot soldiers with crossbowmen and bombards between. Mounted knights guarded the flanks and formed a reserve in the rear. d'Albret's plan was to use the bombards to cut the English lines into smaller sections that could be handled individually. Unfortunately, everybody (including d'Albret!) wanted to be in the front line. It got so dense that the bombards couldn't be fired, as they would hit more French than English. They actually were fired once, to no effect.
Henry laid out his forces in the traditional English fashion, with men-at-arms flanked by wedges of archers, protected by large pointed stakes. (Horses won't charge at big pointy things.) The archers at the ends of the lines were positioned forward from the rest of the troops to give covering fire along the main front. This is an excellent defensive position, but it gives very little scope for attack.
After the forces were arranged, they sat and stared at each other for four hours. The English had no desire to attack, and the French were presumably not pleased at the idea of wading through a mile of mud.
About 11 AM, as some of the French were sending their servants back to camp to bring lunch, Henry decided to force the issue. He ordered his troops to move the line forward, and to reset the positions within extreme longbow range from the French lines. He didn't have enough men-at-arms to form a reserve or to guard the camp. This was to have dramatic consequences later on.
As Henry had planned, the first volley of arrows goaded the French into attacking. The first attack was from the mounted knights on the flanks of the French position, intending to overrun the longbowmen protecting the English flanks. It was a disaster. While an English arrow would not normally penetrate a knight's plate armor, a horse cannot carry enough armor to be effective. Wounded horses threw their riders into the mud and trampled through the close-packed ranks of French foot soldiers. They also churned up the mud in front of the English positions, making things more difficult for future French attacks.
The main French attack was from the first line of men-at-arms. Unfortunately, everybody tried to push their way into the first line, including Constable d'Albret. As they marched toward the English, their line was squeezed together by the narrowing field, until they were so close together that they couldn't lift their arms to use their weapons. However, even with the mud and the crowding, the shock of the French men-at-arms hitting the English line was terrific, throwing the lines back for several yards.
It was, however, ineffectual. Despite some terrific fighting, the English line was never in any serious danger. While men-at-arms in plate armor are normally quite mobile, the combination of the mud and the crowding made them almost helpless. The English simply knocked them down, to drown or suffocate under fallen bodies.
The second line of men-at-arms followed the first. Now, however, there was the added complication that the English positions were blocked by a wall of bodies. The second line had no better luck against the arrows, mud, and English men-at-arms than the first.
After the collapse of the second line, the English common soldiers started in on the traditional battlefield activity of taking prisoners for rensom and stripping the armor and jewelry from the dead. However, the remaining French forces, both the survivors of the first two lines and the entire third line, plus the crossbowman, easily outnumbered the English. As the counts of Marle and Fauquembergues tried to rally the French for a third attack, Henry gave the order to kill the prisoners. This removed the risk of the prisoners turning on their captors and freed their guards for duty elsewhere.
The difference was the longbow. That's why they won that battle and half a dozen others like it against the French over the next 50 years.
By the way, wikipedia claims that the arrows tested in the television program you're referring to were iron tipped. I would be surprised if arrows were still being iron tipped against steel-clad enemies.
It doesn't make a difference. I've seen it done all sorts of ways and it doesn't work.
Historians tend to agree with the above account of the battle. The Longbow goaded the French into attacking and killed horses in the initial cavalry charge. But the main attack was by heavily armoured French infantry. Crowding and the mud rendered this ineffective.
The English longbowmen killed more Frenchmen hand to hand than with the longbow.
As usual, the legend surrounding the battle tends to crowd out obvious facts.
Nah, the best battle has to be Rorkes Drift. Yes, The british were not as outnumbered as some others have been in some battles, and they were facing old(ish) men who had been marching for the past 2 (?) days, but when you don't even have 2 hours to set up a defence, you have to admire the tenacity.
The English advanced to within bowshot in an attempt to goad the French into attacking.
It worked. The French cavalry attacked. However the mud and bowshots against horses repulsed this attack.
Note that the French still have the advantage after this little episode.
The French sent in their heavy infantry. The funnel effect of the terrain and the mud turned this into a crowd disaster. Unable to maneuver many French soldiers fell over and sank in the mud, those that did reach the English line were at a massive disadvantage due to the crowding and the mud and had their heads bashed in.
The idea that the English longbows mowed down the French as they advanced is pure bunk.
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