Originally posted by Blackleaf
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Greatest Seige/Last Stand
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Last edited by Pink; 25 Feb 09,, 00:18.
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Originally posted by Pink View PostI've been to the Alamo museum in San Antonio and I was surprised to see all the names of the dead with country of origin, half of which were European....English, Scots, Irish, Dutch, German and so on....Texas wasn't even in the US at that point. Cowboy films with John Wayne are great, but factual>>>>>?????. Same goes for Rourkes drift. A bunch of welsh sheep farmers armed with the latest rifles, in somebody elses country. Beat a bunch of black guys with pointed sticks......whoopy doo!......who was braver, oh I wonder....
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Originally posted by zraver View PostThat is rather unfair, the zulus had rifles
and more importantly the Impi used a system and tactics a Roman centurion would have felt at home in
the Zulus were one of the few groups to give the British a hard dose
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Originally posted by Pink View PostOh come off it. They got the rifles from the previous battle a few days prior and didn't know one end of the rifle from the other.
Tell me if I'm wrong but I'm not aware of many Romans being confronted with sustained musket fire.
1- The Romans had to face Parthian bowmen with a much higher rate of fire and longer range than a brownbess equipped musketry force.
2- The Zulus didn't face muskets either, but breech loading rifles. Better in the direct fire role than the Parthian bow, but a still slower rate of fire.
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Originally posted by zraver View PostI think your mixing history here. SS Nordland did indeed fight inside Berlin. 2 of its surviving Tigers (or Tigers attached to it) did a masterful job even out of fuel. However I think the Frenchman you refer to was actually a Belgian (Degrelle) and the last award Iron crosses were IIRC given to members of the Hitler Youth shortly before Hitler's suicide.
Sorry, my reference was to the Citadel, not the Reichstag. Long time since I read the book._________________
Deo Vindice
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Originally posted by LadyLawyer View PostI get my information from the book Berlin by Anthony Read and David Fisher. They site the last Knight's Cross was given to a Sergeant Eugene Vaulot (so I guess technically we would both be correct, the Knight's Cross being a higher award). Vaulot was awarded his first Iron Cross on the Russian Front.
Sorry, my reference was to the Citadel, not the Reichstag. Long time since I read the book.
Léon Degrelle received the Ritterkreuz on 20 Feb 1944, and the subsequent Oak Leaves award in late August 1944 (Wikipedia in English says Aug 27, French version says Aug 25), so he couldn't have been the last recipient.
Degrelle did not fight in Berlin with 11. SS-Freiwilligen-Panzergrenadier-Division Nordland, but rather with 28. SS-Freiwilligen-Grenadier-Division Wallonien, which was part of Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner's SS-Panzer-Armeeoberkommando 11.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Degrelle
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Degrelle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5th_SS_...gade_Wallonien
The Wikipedia article on the Ritterkreuz has a box on the right side that shows the last date of award as "11 May 1945 / 17 June 1945[a]." The footnote explains the last award thus:* [a] Großadmiral Karl Dönitz had ordered a cease of all promotions and awards as of 11 May 1945 (Dönitz decree). Consequently the last Knight's Cross awarded to Oberleutnant zur See of the Reserves Georg-Wolfgang Feller on 17 June 1945 must therefore be considered a de facto but not de jure hand-out.[9]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knight's_Cross_of_the_Iron_Cross
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"For a Civil War soldier, owning a Henry rifle was a point of pride. Although it was never officially adopted for service by the Army, many Union soldiers purchased Henry rifles with their own funds. The brass framed rifles could fire at a rate of 28 rounds per minute when used correctly, so soldiers who saved their pay to buy one often believed that the rifle would help them survive. They were frequently used by scouts, skirmishers, flank guards, and raiding parties, rather than in regular infantry formations."
Since, repeting rifles existed already during the American civil war , why were the regular british inf. not equipped with such a weapon during the anglo- zulu war ?
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Originally posted by GraniteForge View PostI am not very well versed in German awards, but from the Internet, I gleaned this:
Léon Degrelle received the Ritterkreuz on 20 Feb 1944, and the subsequent Oak Leaves award in late August 1944 (Wikipedia in English says Aug 27, French version says Aug 25), so he couldn't have been the last recipient.
Degrelle did not fight in Berlin with 11. SS-Freiwilligen-Panzergrenadier-Division Nordland, but rather with 28. SS-Freiwilligen-Grenadier-Division Wallonien, which was part of Obergruppenführer Felix Steiner's SS-Panzer-Armeeoberkommando 11.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Degrelle
http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Degrelle
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/5th_SS_...gade_Wallonien
The Wikipedia article on the Ritterkreuz has a box on the right side that shows the last date of award as "11 May 1945 / 17 June 1945[a]." The footnote explains the last award thus:* [a] Großadmiral Karl Dönitz had ordered a cease of all promotions and awards as of 11 May 1945 (Dönitz decree). Consequently the last Knight's Cross awarded to Oberleutnant zur See of the Reserves Georg-Wolfgang Feller on 17 June 1945 must therefore be considered a de facto but not de jure hand-out.[9]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knight's_Cross_of_the_Iron_Cross
I don't know how Donitz could order that when we know that Hitler did give out an Iron Cross to the young boy mentioned earlier, but that was not as late as Vaulot. That order would invalidate the young boy's Iron Cross.
As to Vaulot:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eugene_Vaulot
which backs up the information I have from the book Berlin._________________
Deo Vindice
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Zraver,
That is what I remembered about the Zulus too. Rifles were both a weapon and a status symbol of distinguished Zulu warriors and they had more firearms then the defending Brits.
Lawyerlady,
Watch out for Wehrmacht claims for late war. They claimed more Russian tanks KOed in Berlin than the total armor strength of the Red Army then.All those who are merciful with the cruel will come to be cruel to the merciful.
-Talmud Kohelet Rabbah, 7:16.
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Originally posted by Triple C View PostZraver,
That is what I remembered about the Zulus too. Rifles were both a weapon and a status symbol of distinguished Zulu warriors and they had more firearms then the defending Brits.
Lawyerlady,
Watch out for Wehrmacht claims for late war. They claimed more Russian tanks KOed in Berlin than the total armor strength of the Red Army then.
Hi. Oh, I have no idea if the claim is valid as far as what he did. The claim is who earned the last Knight's Cross/Iron Cross. We have the picture of Hitler with the young boy. Is Vaulot's legendary? He was killed in the battle of Berlin apparently two days later._________________
Deo Vindice
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Originally posted by gabriel View Post"For a Civil War soldier, owning a Henry rifle was a point of pride. Although it was never officially adopted for service by the Army, many Union soldiers purchased Henry rifles with their own funds. The brass framed rifles could fire at a rate of 28 rounds per minute when used correctly, so soldiers who saved their pay to buy one often believed that the rifle would help them survive. They were frequently used by scouts, skirmishers, flank guards, and raiding parties, rather than in regular infantry formations."
Since, repeting rifles existed already during the American civil war , why were the regular british inf. not equipped with such a weapon during the anglo- zulu war ?
This is way off the mark.
I will try to address sepcifically tomorrow.
Suffice it to say that magazine fed rapid loading rifles as standard INFANTRY arms would be a turn of the century weapon...none that early.“Loyalty to country ALWAYS. Loyalty to government, when it deserves it.”
Mark Twain
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