In the flat, open fields, the golden helmets of the French dragoons glistened in the sun, and the mane tails behind their helmets flicked rhythmically as their sturdy horses marched proudly. Pen, fun, pavilion www. biquge。 After the disastrous defeat in the Franco-Prussian War, some French generals felt that large-scale cavalry warfare was no longer suitable for the development of the war, but similar proposals were ultimately rejected on the grounds that the French people could not emotionally accept the disappearance of cavalry. Thus, at the outbreak of war in 1914, the French cavalry division had the largest number of participating countries, and the distinction between cuirassiers, dragoons, and light cavalry was traditionally retained.

In the first weeks of the war, the French cavalry in shiny helmets became an excellent target for German riflemen, and some cavalry officers had their soldiers wrap their helmets in blue cloth, but this practice was neither accepted by their superiors nor became a common practice. At the forefront of this group of fierce French dragoons, the burly Major Ngoy held his chin high, his neck up, and his chest puffed out, and he was like a proud rooster. He wore a black tunic made by a dragoon officer, with braided silver epaulettes and shear-feather trims, dark breeches and black leather boots with spurs, and a pistol holster made of burnished black leather.

One of the wayfinders returned and joined the cavalry from the flank, and then reported to the major: "We have arrived at Grimache, and the manor in front of us is the designated battle assembly place of the division headquarters. Sir, we've heard...... The estate was the private property of Senator Mr. Bennard, who often entertained Parisian dignitaries here in peacetime. ”

"Got it!" The Major's tone was disapproving, and seeing that the manor was three or four kilometers away, he ordered loudly: "All trot forward!" ”

The marching speed of cavalry, from slow to fast, can be divided into ordinary march, rapid march, trotting forward and full speed sprint. After speeding up, the sound of the horse's hooves suddenly became much more intense, and the "horsetail" behind the helmets of the cavalry was also thrown more elegantly.

As with the infantry units, the cavalry also sent reconnaissance outposts on the march, and the French cavalry who were exploring the way in front of them were the first to get very close to the manor. They scattered and watched warily at the open field, where there were no German soldiers, but there was not a single figure in sight of the huge manor. At this time, the French cavalry must have wondered: did the men run out, or did the people inside not want to have anything to do with the soldiers of the warring sides?

Major Ngoy was completely unconcerned about the strange atmosphere here, and he led his cavalry troops straight to the manor. During this period, the French cavalry outpost did not mean to knock on the gate of the manor, but waited for the arrival of the commander. In less than a quarter of an hour, Major Ngoy and his brigade of cavalry arrived at the gate of the manor, and the major turned and dismounted, and was about to enter and requisition the manor in a grand manner, when suddenly a rain of bullets was fired from it. The French cavalry were defenseless, and in the blink of an eye, twenty or thirty fell from their horses. The French cavalry close to the gate dismounted and fought, and the cavalry a little further away from the gate hurriedly rode their horses to avoid being exposed to enemy machine-gun fire in a dense formation.

With his astonishing reflexes and good luck, Major Ngoy crawled to the base of the wall unscathed. Enraged by the sight of the corpses of his soldiers, he led his dismounted cavalry to fire at the enemy through the wall. The lower half of the manor's walls were made of masonry, and the upper half was an iron fence, the whole was not very high, and there was no difficult barbed wire, and the major wanted to send his riders over the wall to enter the manor after suppressing the enemy's fire, but the opponent's combat effectiveness was obviously beyond his expectations, and most of the enemy's shooters were on the second and third floors of the building, and they had a condescending shooting advantage over the French cavalry. Within a few minutes, the French cavalry outside the wall fell by more than a dozen.

Realizing that the situation was not good, Major Ngoi hurriedly ordered the riders around him to take concealment first, and could not find a shooting target, and the gunfire in the manor gradually weakened. The French cavalry, who had not dismounted, retreated on their own in a very unfavorable situation and regrouped beyond the range of enemy bullets, and they would have been unstoppable in the battle if they had given the order of Major Ngoy.

It would have been possible to blast open the main entrance of the manor and allow the cavalry on horseback to launch a forced charge, but the Major and the riders around him had neither explosives nor grenades, nor could they have smashed the door locks with the butts of their guns in the face of the enemy's heavy bullets, and the heavy cavalry company with wheeled machine guns and cavalry guns was still far behind. There was no point in continuing to languish outside the wall, and Major Ngoi looked around, and then reluctantly moved west along the wall with more than twenty riders around him. They found a low sewer canal and slowly but carefully withdrew from the battle along it.

Out of range of enemy bullets covered in stains, Major Ngoy blew his whistle and several dragoons galloped in, one of whom stopped beside the major and extended his hand to him. Without hesitation, the major took advantage of his mount and returned to the regrouped cavalry unit.

A rough count shows that this battalion of dragoons lost more than 70 riders and more than 80 horses. Nearly one-third of the combat strength was lost, and he didn't even see the appearance of the opponent, this battle was fought enough, and it also showed the cunning of the opponent. Ngoy's telescope in the box sleeve broke, and he asked for a telescope from another battalion officer, looked at the manor for a long time, and then said to his men: "There must not be many Germans in number, otherwise there would be no need to be so secretive." ”

But not everyone was as indomitable as the major, and one cavalry company commander replied with trepidation: "It is estimated that they have three or four machine guns, and at least two platoons of riflemen, and occupy a strong, walled building, which is very disadvantageous to us." ”

Major Ngoy glanced at him coldly: "This German unit attacking Amiens is equipped with more machine guns than any one we have encountered before, it may be William's Royal Guard unit, elite and strong, but the overall scale is relatively small. While the bulk of the German army is far from here, we should take the manor, annihilate this small German reconnaissance force, capture a few prisoners, and preferably their officers, and surely interrogate valuable information. ”

This sounds like a good idea, but the key is whether the cavalry battalion is capable of defeating the German forces occupying the manor, even if they are really a small reconnaissance force.

Major Ngoy saw the concern of his cavalry, and he said righteously: "These Germans have just concentrated all their fire in one direction, and have taken us by surprise, trying to make us mistakenly think that they are strong, and want us to retreat on our own in fear. We surrounded the manor and attacked from all sides at the same time, so that they could take care of one or the other, as long as one of us entered the manor, blew open the main hall door, and rushed into the house on horseback, the narrow aisles and rooms were not conducive to the transfer of machine gun positions, and we could easily cut off their heads with cavalry swords! ”

With that, the major drew his sword, stepped aside, sat down, and wiped the blade with his handkerchief over and over again. It was not until more than half an hour later, when the heavy cavalry company dragged two Hatch Chase machine guns and four 65 mm cavalry guns, that he suddenly got up and gave an order to the cavalrymen with bright eyes: "Pendit, you take the second company to attack from the south; Moreo, you attack from the east with three companies; Simon, you attack from the north with four companies; The rest of me attacked from the west. Fifteen minutes later, the attack was launched on time. Let's go! ”

This tone is categorical and non-negotiable.

At the same time, Warrant Officer Wetchervica was prostrate on the roof of the manor building, holding a telescope to observe the French cavalry retreating into the distance. When he saw that the opponent had deployed his machine-gun guns on the spot, and had divided all the cavalry into threes, one team remained in place, and the two teams went around the north and south sides, and that one group of cavalry was significantly outnumbered by the other two, he immediately realized that his opponent was preparing to attack from all sides.

As the commander of this French dragoon unit expected, Warrant Officer Wachervica had only one cavalry reconnaissance platoon in his hands, and there were only 27 people in total, excluding the orderlies who went to report the news, but fortunately they were equipped with four Madsen light machine guns and relatively sufficient ammunition.

Before the start of the battle, the young warrant officer asked two of his non-commissioned officers to go around the house twice and reported to him about the main structure of the building. There are two passages up and down the stairs, one is the ornate staircase of the main hall, and the other is the ordinary staircase of the corridor. Thinking that it would be difficult to prevent the French army from entering the manor with the little force at hand, Warrant Officer Wetcherica had an idea and hurriedly ordered the soldiers to pile up the motorcycles at the entrance of the staircase in the main hall, and block the corridor and stairs with tables, chairs and furniture, and all the staff retreated to the second and third floors. In terms of firepower, four Madsen light machine guns were deployed in four directions, the riflemen were evenly distributed, and the four sergeants who were issued pistols formed a mobile squad to concentrate on the third floor to listen to orders.

After two cigarettes, the French cavalry really set up a siege on all sides, they had more than 200 people, and they were beaten by Warrant Officer Wetchervica, but now there were only 1670 men left, and the strength was even weaker after the dispersal. Still, when the cavalry shelled down the walls of the manor, they saw hope of victory. As the time for the attack came, the French cavalry resolutely plunged into this difficult and dangerous battle. They held their cavalry swords aloft, and as their forefathers of the French Republic had shown in all wars, they charged as if they were dead, whether it was a hedgehog-like infantry gun formation or a well-prepared artillery position.

(End of chapter)