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  • #31
    Originally posted by Blackleaf View Post
    The Battle of Rorke's Drift in 1879 is a good example of one of the very rare occasion where the defending force WINS.



    Just 139 British soldiers successfully defended their garrison against an intense assault by four to five THOUSAND Zulu warriors. Just 17 British were killed and 350 Zulus.

    Compare that to The Alamo in 1836, when 260 Americans (compared to 139 British at Rorke's Drift) defended their area against just 2,400 Mexicans (compared to around twice the number of Zulus at Rorke's Drift). Nearly all the Americans were killed and just 400 Mexicans in a convincing Mexican win.


    British soldiers stand down after their epic battle against the Zulus, 1879.

    Another glorious last stand is that by Prince Rupert's Bluecoats during the Batte of Naseby in 1645 during the English Civil War.
    I'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....
    Last edited by Pink; 25 Feb 09,, 00:18.

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    • #32
      Originally posted by Pink View Post
      I'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....
      That 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. While using a formation designed to deliver mass for a stabbing attack against modern rifles is a recipe for disaster, the Zulus were one of the few groups to give the British a hard dose of fear from the use of cold steel. Putting poky things in the other guys guts was normally what the British did to others, not what they had done to them.

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      • #33
        Originally posted by zraver View Post
        That is rather unfair, the zulus had rifles
        Oh 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.


        and more importantly the Impi used a system and tactics a Roman centurion would have felt at home in
        Tell me if I'm wrong but I'm not aware of many Romans being confronted with sustained musket fire.

        the Zulus were one of the few groups to give the British a hard dose
        LOL, I won't go there!!:))

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        • #34
          The Seige of Dunkirk, Sep 1944 - May 1945.

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          • #35
            Originally posted by Chaobam Armour View Post
            The Seige of Dunkirk, Sep 1944 - May 1945.
            Yeh there were a few Coastal holiday towns they were taken with!!!!

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            • #36
              Originally posted by Pink View Post
              Oh 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.
              They had existed side by side with the Boers for years, they knew how to use a rifle, what they lacked was rifles and ammuntion in numbers.


              Tell me if I'm wrong but I'm not aware of many Romans being confronted with sustained musket fire.
              Your wrong

              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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              • #37
                Originally posted by zraver View Post
                I 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.
                I 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.
                _________________

                Deo Vindice

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                • #38
                  Reading about the anglo-zulu war i was surprised by the will of the zulus to engage siege attacks (Kambula) against the British, since they proved themselves before to be very effective in maneuver warfare.

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                  • #39
                    Originally posted by LadyLawyer View Post
                    I 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.
                    I 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

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                    • #40
                      "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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                      • #41
                        Originally posted by GraniteForge View Post
                        I 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
                        Sorry, OT, but
                        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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                        • #42
                          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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                          • #43
                            Originally posted by Triple C View Post
                            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.

                            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

                            Comment


                            • #44
                              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 ?
                              Gabriel

                              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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                              • #45
                                Originally posted by Albany Rifles View Post
                                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.


                                Lee-Metford rifles were produced from 1884 to 1896, not in time for the anglo-zulu war but close.

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