"Glorious Defeats" Topic

Gallipoli
Beth-Zechariah & Elasa for the Maccabean Jews

Westerplatte 1939

Mons 1914 and Le Catauex--- The BEF got beaten and pushed back but gave the Kaiser a real bloody nose!!!

Naval action where a spanish fleet I hink was fought to a standstill by the english ship Revenge captained by Sir Richard Grenville.

The english had gone off to capture a treasure fleet, but had been lured into a trap. Th Spanish sent out a heavily armed escort to beat up the English, however Sir Richard Grenville turned his ship about to fave off against the enemy fleet. He gave the English time to escape, fought the Spanish for several hours. By the end Sir Richard and most of the crew were dead or wounded. About half a dozen men survived.

Now that's seamanship!

My Apaches vs. my mate's over-mighty bandidoes. I still didn't win, but it was the first time I've seen his Mexicans brick themselves…

If Culloden is 'glorious' then I guess Worcester must be?

The Battle of Move to Baltimore 2009. Incredible carnage. No Glory.

The Battle of Move to Baltimore 2009. Incredible carnage. No Glory

No kidding. I'm having a really hard time understanding why that took place. In effect, it doubles my costs to attend, with no appreciable increase in what's being offered.

I'd love to see an alternative convention run on the same weekend for those like myself who disagree with the move.

respects,

Qadesh?

-Get ambushed (bad)
-Lose 1/4 to 1/3 of your army (crippling)
-Fail to take the campaign objective (crushing)

-Immortalize your personal triumphs forever in the temples of Egypt (PRICELESS!)

I was thinking about THE MISSION myself, but its not a historical event. (Is it?)

Nicopolis – the Turks won the battle and the campaign, but the Glory of the Western knights charge won them fame throughout Christendom.

Think destruction of missions by Portuguese depicted in THE MISSION is history but not the film's actual story.

I thing the French generally were good at these.

Fuengirola, Spain, 1810, Poles outnumbered 10 to 1 and they beat the British even capturing the opposing General. A truly heroic defense that never gets the credit it deserves.

bandrsntch
''Fuengirola, Spain, 1810, Poles outnumbered 10 to 1 and they beat the British even capturing the opposing General. A truly heroic defense that never gets the credit it deserves.''

How was it a defeat?

Hardly a purely British force either…apart from that and it not being a defeat for the Poles, I think he was spot on.

Fall of Constantinople 1453.

After the walls were breached, the last Emperor of Rome ripped off his purple cloak, drew his sword, and died along with his men. His body was never found.

Having ripped the guts out of Byzantium in 1204, the rest Western Europe just watched as the lights went out in Eastern Europe.

We are still dealing with the consequences today.

Tannenberg/Grunwald, 1410 is kinda hard to beat. Teutonic Knights exiting with style, what with the Grandmaster, the Great Marshall, the Great Chancellor, and over 600 white cloak komturs finding their death on the battlefield…

Little Big Horn. Custer screwed up and got wiped out, still has movies and books made about it.

4th Kawanakajima…Kenshin's army is driven from the field with nearly 75% killed or wounded, yet he wins eternal glory as a tactical genius and as having saved Echigo from the grip of the Takeda.

Ei! Ei! Oh!

Tactical defeats that were heroic in that they ultimately lead to victory OR immortality.

Why a defeat that ultimatly lead to victory would automatically be called 'heroic'? Heroism has more to do with the conduct of the men (and sometimes women) involved (on the defeated side, here) than with the strategical results.
An ancillary question, here and for 'last stands', could be "Did they have a choice?" The Little Big Horn and Isandhlwana are differnt from, say, Camerone. On the other hand, whether the defeat was caused by a blunder at higher level or not, whether the protracted resistance achieved something at a larger scale or not, have no bearing on the 'panache' of the vanquished.

As for 'immortality'… it is subject to the context. For instance

>Berlin, WWII.

A Soviet victory over a decidedly nasty regime. Not glorious at all, based on what I've read, especially for the civilians.

Besides the fact that the thread is about defeats glorious *for the defeated* (your opponent's defeat is always a'glorious' victory), the last defenders of Berlin (or for that matter the French volunteers of the 'Charlemagne', whose numerous 'last stands' by scattered battalions allowed the evacuation of tens of thousands of German civilians, from Körlin for instance) are denied any 'glory' or 'immortality' because of the 'decidely nasty regime', not for want of 'heroism'.

In the same way, in French collective memory Dien Bien Phu is occulted by some 'political embarrassment'. I remenber it well, my first 'political' memory -I was just 10 and my parents followed the siege on the radio (a monumental furniture, no transistors then). From march 13 on we listened the Journal Parle at midday an 8 p.m., as the fortified hills with girls names -Beatrice, Gabrielle, Eliane, Anne-Marie… fell one after the other. On may 8 at midday we heard that all contact was lost with Isabelle, the last 'position'.
Every man there (and the girls of the Bordel Militaire de Campagne, who turned to improvised nurses as soon as the siege began- every soldier in Indochina knew from march 13 that the 'Camp retranche' was lost -on this day the colonel commanding the artillery there commited suicide, contrary to his promises his guns could not silence the viet artillery and he felt guilty of the doom of his comrades. Yet hundred of soldiers -some already waiting for the homebound ship, their 'tour of duty' accomplished, and many who had never seen a parachute before- volunteered to be dropped on Dien Bien Phu; not to contribute to an impossible victory, but to be with the copains. As silly as magnificient. A journalist, his sympathies for the Viet Minh notwithstanding, wrote of 'a nirvana of heroism'.

2nd assault on fort Wagner, ACW

Camerone

hussarbob1746.webs.com

I'm not sure that Camerone qualifies as a 'defeat', given the diminituve size of the battle -the fight, rather: only 63 men on the French side.
But for sure an 'ideal' last stand:
-not caused by a blunder -convoys *are* ambushed by guerillas,
-the men had the choice to surrender -it was offered four times,
-of the men entranched in the farm of Camaron only 3 survived,
-their mission was accomplished: by pinning 2000 Mexicans during 11 hours, they allowed the convoy they were to protect to pass unmolested.

As for glory… in addition to the importance of Camerone in the ethos and mythos of the Legion, it is quite rare that soldiers of a given country honour a monument to foreign invaders, as the Mexican army still does to-day.

The Patriots vs the Colts last night, I hope…

University of Idaho versus Boise State on Saturday. Idaho's best score since 2000.

SteveCooperOnTheLaptop

The action which inspired Sir Henry Newbolt to write his magnificent poem 'Vitaď Lampada' was the battle of Abu Klea, fought in the Sudan in 1885. The Colonel who died was Colonel Burnaby, who inspired the men by taking on the Fuzzie Wuzzies with a fowling piece. Though the poem claimed it was a Gatling that jammed, you are correct to state it was actually a Gardener. And though Newbolt claimed the desert was red with the blood of a square that broke, that is not entirely true either. The square certainly gave a little, but the British won the day – so by no means a defeat, though certainly glorious.

sorry – that should have been addressed to:

'CooperSteveOnTheLaptop'

though you probably managed to work that out.

The Battle of Franklin, Tennessee. Forrest told Hood that fighting this battle was a needless act of Hood's punishment for his own divisional commanders (for allowing Schofield's Federal Army to march past Cheatham's night encampment/positions).

Had Hood listened to Forrest and slidesliped Franklin, he would have increased the Confederate chances of possibly defeating Thomas' army at Nashville.

Wayne

TGA, I think you may be thinking of Charles the Bold, not Charles V.

I'd say Marignano, where the Swiss are defeated by the French and Venetians – though outnumbered, with no cavalry and few guns and attacking across a ditch in some parts of the line, they come within a hairs breath of victory until the Venetians arrive to their rear on the second day of battle, then march off in good order. This despite being confronted by thousands of German pikemen, the largest and best corps of gendarme cavalry in Europe, and the largest and most modern artillery park to boot.

Contemporaries called it "the Battle of Giants."

Giants vs Undefeated Patriots in the regular season. It gave them the morale boost they needed to win it all.

Although small, the "Pools of Cresson", 1187, is a truly glorious defeat. It is my personal favorite.

what's the oldest piece of news that can be dragged from the archives?