"History's greatest Last Stand?" Topic

Definition of a Last Stand:
1. No possibility of retreat.
2. Little possibility of relief.
3. Near zero odds of victory.
4. Against an overwhelming force.

My choices:
The Japanese at Iwo Jima or Tarawa.
US marines at Wake Island.
Last Stand of the Tin Cans at the Battle off Samar

And Pelelieu! Don't forget that one.

How do you measure greatness?. I see a lot of greatness and sacrifice on all the accounts named but I can not see any way of comparing them.

What about the German defense at Tsingtao in World War I? It's not well known to most folks, but a ragtag group of German marines, militia and local station troops, including a small gun boat flotilla and the first use of aircraft in offense during the war (you had a pair of Taube's dropping bombs on the invading forces) held off an enormous Japanese (with a tiny British contingent) invasion force in an ultimately doomed effort to retain their Eastern colony.

How about the French fight against the British in World War II in Madagascar? You have a truly bizarre situation where Britain invades a French colony at a point where North Africa was still in doubt, and we were years away from Normandy. The battle went on for over 6 months with even some involvement by a (tiny) Japanese support force.

While far from 'the greatest, both of these now relatively unknown last stands were fought during major wars.

I was quite inspired by Danjou's stand at Camerone: link

62 soldiers and 3 officers against initially 600 cavalry, and eventually 1200 Mexicans.

"We have munitions. We will not surrender"

My offerings:

Dunkirk

Stalingrad

Seige of Lille in 1940

I'm not sure about including naval battles in last stands. There is very little choice about remaining instead of running away when you crew a ship.

The 1st and 2nd battles for Tobruk. Either depending on the definition of "Last Stand."

Geoff: D'accord! Camerone was a classical last stand

For total numbers.

Stalingrad
Iwo Jima

The Last Stand of Fort St. Elmo during the Siege of Malta in 1565. It became a last-stand when the garrison was cut off but fought to the last rather than evacuate or surrender. Their heroic defense cost the Turks dearly (including Turgut Reis being killed) and bought precious time for a relief force to be raised and sent to the rescue. The defeat of the Turks is seen by many as a turning point in turning back the Ottomans from Europe.

link

I forgot a link to the Wikipedia on the Siege

The 101st at Bastogne..

The Guard at the end of Waterloo..

20th Maine at Gettysburg..

Corrigedor..

The Russians at Port Arthur.. (tho they surrendered)

but the tops are Thermopylae and Camerone..

the saxon housecarls at hastings

Hmmmmm

No one picked Berlin – 45. You may not like the Nazi Germans but you have to admit they gave it all they had in a hopeless situation.

mjc

I think that we went from last stands only, to heroic stands against vastly suprior numbers. On that note I'd like to add Khe Sahn during the first Tet, and Wheat's Tigers at the Stone Bridge during the First Manassas.

As far as the Alamo goes it gave Houston the time he needed to assemble his army,so IMHO WAS NOT a complete waste of their lives those men did what they HAD to do and i have great respect for Davy Crockett,James Bowie,William Barrett Travis and the rest of those men.

Captain Gideon

Mes ami Essayon, c'est vrai

Camerone!

Vive la morte
Vive la guerre
Vive la Legion Etranger

Je conviens !

Merci, Frederick!

Now, you've exhausted my knowledge of the French language!

I have about 100 miniatures for Camerone sitting in a box that need my attention some day.

Perhaps this discussion will get me off my lazy buttocks and around to priming them up!

King Harrald at Stamford Bridge
King Harold at Hastings
Boadicea against the Romans
Sarsfield in Ireland

Camerone may not have changed the course of history for Mexico or France, but its still damned inspiring.

If you want one that is not Anglo-Centric, than how about Wounded Knee. Definitely satisfies many of the criteria set forth. Overwhelming odds, no chance of winning etc. I do believe that the Sioux warriors would call it a heroic stand on their part.

The 1890 Wounded Knee or the 1973 Wounded Knee?

The Swiss at the Berezina River in 1812.
The Yorks & Lancs in Burma 1942.
The last men of the Warwicks on Isanwhadana hill 187???.
The Russians at Brest Livtosk 1941.
But there are so many more though.

M

Using this:

Definition of a Last Stand:
1. No possibility of retreat.
2. Little possibility of relief.
3. Near zero odds of victory.
4. Against an overwhelming force.

I'll concur with quidveritas-Berlin '45. More troops involved all the way around, the most deaths incurred, both civilian and military, and the most impact on today's lives.

Ralph

I prefer Gloworm and Johnston over Jervis Bay simply because in the case of Gloworm, ramming a vastly bigger foe as a last resort seems the ultimate gesture and in Johnston's case, she took a vastly bigger opponent with her in torpedoing an IJN CA.

I assume that Stalingrad would be the largest last stand.

I'll add a number 5 "No chance of surrender"

Well i wont try to be a fancy pants and come up with some obscure one but I will state the one that first popped into my mind when reading the heading of this thread- Little Bighorn
A last stand for many reasons
Custer and co are wiped out.
As a result of this great victory the Plains tribe are themselves nearly wiped out in the aftermath and reprisals.

So for a Last Stand on both sides of the ledger and anyway its been so romanticised that it has to be the epitomy of last stands.

First Naval Battle of Guadalcanal – Alternatively, the action off Sumar during the Battle of Leyte Gulf: both heroic stands against the odds that were great sacrifices.

My favorites of those previously mentioned:

The Guides defence of the Embassy in Kabul
Hats off to willthepiper for mentioning Serenity Valley (even if it is fiction).

Mark

My favourites:

1st place: Thermopylae
2nd place: Fort St Elmo (Malta, 1565)
3rd place: The Old Tercio at Rocroi.

"I prefer Gloworm and Johnston over Jervis Bay simply because in the case of Gloworm, ramming a vastly bigger foe as a last resort seems the ultimate gesture and in Johnston's case, she took a vastly bigger opponent with her in torpedoing an IJN CA."

I can't see a significant difference. HMAC Jervis Bay was much slower than her opponent, had inferior guns, both in hitting power and range, as well as number, and layout, and was effectively unarmoured. I don't count sandbags around the wheelhouse as armour! She was a converted cargo ship, so she was high in the water and unmanovreable, so was also an easy target. Her crew knew that she hadn't a hope against the Scheer, yet she took the Scheer on.

The SS Beaverford's case is even more of a "Last Stand", a cargo ship with a Merchant Navy crew, an obsolete gun mounted aft, and a cargo of munitions, taking on a modern German "Panzerschiff". There was only one outcome possible, yet her Merchant Navy crew , civilians, fought the Scheer until the "Beaverford" was fatally hit and blew up, taking her crew with her. She kept the Scheer occupied for nearly 5 hours, giving the scattering convoy time to escape, and convincing the Scheer that continuing after the convoy may be too risky a course to follow.

I think the fight against excessive cross-posting might end up in a heroic last stand…

<<<a section of the 1st Malay Brigade (7th Platoon, C Company) on Bukit Chandu at the Battle of Pasir Panjang>>>

Can I get some more info on this action please?

Also would like to know about The 44th at Gandamak--never heard of that one!

I think the fight against excessive cross-posting might end up in a heroic last stand…

LOL!

Ralph

Thermopylae.

Lot of good candidates for 2nd place posted above.

The British invaded Afghanistan, and an army under Elphinstone was forced to retreat from Kabul. In Winter. Perhaps the worst time to retreat fom anywhere, but especially fom Kabul.

The army was 4500 strong, and there were about 12 000 civillians, Indian, Afghan and European. of the Soldiers only 690 were british, most of these being the 44th foot.

The colum was harrassed through out the whole retreat, 3000 dying from sniping, freezing (the indians in paticular suffered I think) many also committed suicide over three days. They marched through 2 feet of snow and only made it 12 miles at this point.

the last 60 odd soldiers, (45 rankers fom the 44th, and 20 officers from 44th and Indian regiments)

This is taken from Wikipedia

"The men had no shelter and little food for weeks. The ground was frozen and icy. Only a dozen of the men had working muskets, the officers their pistols and a few unbroken swords. When the Afghans surrounded them on the morning of the 13th the Afghans announced that a surrender could be arranged. "Not bloody likely!" was the bellowed answer of one British sergeant.

It is believed that only two survived the massacre. More notable in the English-speaking world at least is Captain Thomas Souter, who with the regimental colours wrapped around himself was taken prisoner, being mistaken by the Afghan as a high military official. The other was Surgeon William Brydon who made it as far as the British garrison at Jalalabad after riding his exhausted horse to the limit for days; his fate forms the backdrop for the 1859 German poem Das Trauerspiel von Afghanistan ("The Tragedy of Afghanistan") by Theodor Fontane.

The final stand took place at Gandamak on the morning of 13 January 1842 in the snow.[1] 20 officers and 45 European soldiers, mostly of the 44th Foot, found themselves surrounded on a hillock.[1] The Afghans attempted to persuade the soldiers that they intended them no harm. Then the sniping began followed by a series of rushes.[1] Captain Souter wrapped the colors of the regiment around his body and was dragged into captivity with two or three soldiers.[1] The remainder were shot or cut down. Only 6 mounted officers escaped. Of these 5 were killed along the road"

The Battle of Maldon is a classic from around 800 AD (bit shaky on the exact date). A band of Viking raiders provoked a response from the local Saxon Earl, Beorthnoth, Beorthelm's son, who rushed to the scene with his huscarls. The Vikings were unable to cross from their landing place on a small island in an estuary to the mainland. Although heavily outnumbered, Beorthnoth foolishly permitted the Vikings to cross over, probably realising that if he didn't, they would simply get on their ships and raid elsewhere on an undefended spot.

Needless to say, it all ended in tears. Beorthnoth was killed, but hs huscarls fought to the last man defending his body, at least according to the Saxon poet who wrote the press releases (aka the Old English poem, The Battle of Maldon). The poet has the Huscarls say during the battle that they know they're doomed but will fight on regardless, despite repeated Viking offers of honorable surrender (no doubt to be followed by honorable slavery, if I am any judge of Vikings!).

Probably a fictional tale, but great stuff nonetheless.

The Battle of Mount Street Bridge. 17 against the Sherwood Forresters.

Would Wounded Knee count as a "last stand" it seems to have been more of a massacre than a stand last or otherwise. Also, in the same vein would the battle of the Little Big Horn rate as a last stand? A slaughter certainly, but to me a last stand suggests a conscious decision to not retreat, not to surrender, knowing the odds are stacked against you. Thermopylae, or The '43 Warsaw ghetto uprising would seem to count.

Thermopylae

The grain elevator in Stalingrad is another good one.

Another vote for Camerone. Classic last stand. Also a vote for Spartacus and his slave army against Crassus.

Anyone say United Airlines Flight 93 yet?

Civilian heroics, very little chance of success, and saved what was supposed to be a devastating strike on the Whitehouse…

hair raising account here: link

Illium, ca 1200 BC

Massada

USS Houston and HMAS Perth at Sunda Strait, Anyone?

1)Baraque de Fraiture (Parker's Crossroads)December,1944. (An outnumbered, surrounded mixed force of US troops from 82nd, 106th, 2nd Armored, and 7 Armored Divisions, vs a regiment from the 2SS Panzer division)

(The worst defeat of the US Army by an Indian force.):

2)St. Clair's defeat on the banks of the Wabash November 4, 1791.
St. Clair's forces surrounded and virtually destroyed by Little Turtle's forces.

3)Fallen Timbers 1794.
(indian last stand) Tribal confederation shattered and Treaty of Greenville followed in 1795.

Depends on how one defines last stand I guess.

Stone – France 1940 – a unit of colonial troops who knew they were being sacrificed to hold up the German advance.

The crew of the KV-2 which held up the entire German army for two days at a river crossing.

Iwo Jima – one of the bloodiest last stands.

Not Thermopylae – it was interesting, but rarely told from the Persian point of view and it has been romanticized too much.

There are generally two camps concerning The Alamo:

1) It was a small force facing a huge enemy army, and they fought valiantly while buying time for other forces to muster and prepare to fight.

2) It was a pointless waste of 180 or so lives, they bought about two weeks time, which in the grand scheme of thing was nothing.

Now, that being said, why on EARTH would the Spartans Thermopylae come close to counting? Wasn't that just a huge waste of terrific soldiers?

First off, the NAVAL victory was stunning. THAT certainly was felt by the enemy, and their advance slowed considerably after that. But the foot troops? Wasn't it a 3-day stand-off? If the defenders of the Alamo are considered a waste of lives and they bought 13 days, why would 3 little days of time make any difference at all.

Athens was burned. Sparta was burned. The ultimate Greek victory came much later.

Don't get me wrong, I think the defenders of the Alamo deserve to be remembered, and not as a stupid waste of life either. And the Spartans (and others) at Thermopylae should also be remembered.

Anyone who faces overwhelming odds and willingly keeps on fighting deserves at least a nod of respect.

But I don't see how Thermopylae counts if The Alamo doesn't.

I like the Battle of Britain.

Also Kirk versus the Gorn.

LOL

Phil