WHAT IS IT ABOUT EARLY JULY?? July 1 can be thought of as essentially the mid point of the year, as having come through six months, six months remain. As a fan is history and particularly military history Ive noticed over the years while reading that the start of July seems to be a busy, almost convergence time for events. Maybe this shouldnt be surprising as it is, for the northern hemisphere the prime time for armies to move, free of the rainy constraints of spring and fall. Yet, over the centuries, the first days of July are to remembered for both the spectacle and intensity of the battles that have occurred over the centuries. July 1: July 1 seems a prime day for huge battles. One can go back all the way to 552 and one of the most vicious battles of the early Middle Ages, Taginae when on July 1 of that year A Byzantine army met, and destroyed an invading Ostrogothic barbarian force On July 1, 1690 Great Britain defeated the French at Fleuris CIVIL WAR: Here is an irony. Robert E. Lees monumental career is marred by only two great defeats, Malvern Hill and Gettysburg. Both revolve around the date of July 1, separated by exactly one year. In late June 1862 Robert E. Lee launched a major offensive out of Richmond to break Union General George McClellans siege of the Confederate capital. In a serious of confusing battles over a space of seven days Lee achieved his object but at a terrific price as on the final day, McClellan turned his retreating army and took up defensive positions on Malvern Hill. Lees army charged right in and were given a bloody nose by the mass cannon at the top of the hill. Still, Lee won the campaign if not battle and Richmond was safe. For a year Lee then became the terror of the Union. He embarrassed them time and time again, from Manassas to Fredericksburg to Chancellorsville. He then moved north into Union territory. To stop him, the Union concentrated toward the crossroads of Gettysburg. On July 1 Lee drove the forward Union line out of town, seeming to have won a battle. But the Union reentrenched outside of town. This meant two more days of fighting. And eventual Confederate defeat. July 1 1898: The storming of Santiago Heights. Spanish-American War. The campaign for Cuba came to its most dramatic moment in the bloody fighting for the hills that ringed the town. Theodore Roosevelt became a hero and thus later U.S. President for his histrionics during the fighting. July 1 1916: The Somme: If not well remembered over here, in Europe, especially Great Britain, July 1, 1916 is a sober day of remembrance of the most devastating day of the First World War. After a week long bombardment(that proved an abysmal failure), 150,000 British soldiers went over the top north of the Somme River, France. They marched into a scythe of machine gun and small arms fire. It was the darkest day of British military history, at least 50,000 of the attacking force - one in three - made a casualty. 20,000 were killed. July 1 1918: Belleau Wood: While stretching back into June, it was on July 1, 1918 that the U.S. Marine Corps won its great First World War victory when the wood was finally cleared of German forces. July 1 1942: El Alamein: The Germans attempt to drive the British, Commonweath and French out of North Africa once and for all. The allied line holds. Bernard Montgomery was brought in soon after as British commander and would launch his offensive some months later, defeating Rommel and winning the North African campaign, all resultant of the July 1 battle. July 2 1644: The decisive battle of the English Civil War was fought on July 2, 1644 at Marston Moor. 1852: While not a battle, it was on July 2, 1852 when Russian forces crossed the Danube touching off the Crimean War, one of the longest and bloodiest for Europe during the 19th Century. 1863: Day two at Gettysburg. Lee launches assaults on both Union flanks in some of the most obstinate fighting of the American Civil War. He can not move them off their position at Cemetery Ridge. July 3 1754: The Battle of Fort Necessity during the French and Indian War. George Washingtons most humiliating moment during his career. Attacked and besieged by a greatly superior French force he was forced to surrender at the end of some nasty, bloody fighting. 1775: George Washington redeemed. In historical irony it was on the anniversary of his haunting defeat years before when Washington began his great Revolutionary War career by taking command of the Continental Army at Boston, July 3, 1775 1863: Gettysburg(the reckoning): Lee, in frustration attacks the Union center in what is remembered as Picketts Charge. Hes driven off as certainly as he had one year and two days before at Malvern Hill. It is the end of Confederate hopes of winning the war via an invasion of the north. The Confederates load their wounded and go home. 1866: The Battle of Koeniggratz: Three years after Picketts Charge and half a world away, Helmuth Von Moltke(the elder) with his Prussian army wins his greatest victory in a huge battle against the Austrian army in Bohemia. Moltke had moved his army into Bohemia over the mountains in two columns to find the Austrian army under General Benedek deployed astride the Bistritz River. Moltke could of chosen the safer course and pulled back and awaited the second column to attack frontally but chose to send his available force over the river to hold down the Austrian army while his second column came out of the mountains to the Austrian rear. It was a horrendous battle in places like Sweptwald, Hallowald and the village of Sadova. Whole Prussian regiments disappeared in the face of massive Austrian cannon fire. But the Prussians held them down and too Benedeks horror he found a second Prussian army appearing to his flank and rear, threatening to cut him off from Vienna. The Austrian army managed to fight its way out of the trap but at a horrendous cost of over 40,000 casualties. Moltke had won, what I consider one of the most perfect tactical battles ever fought. 1898: Santiago de Cuba: With the U.S. forces having stormed and taken the heights above the city and the danger of U.S. artillery thus destroying the Spanish fleet in harbor the hard decision was made by the Spanish to try and break out with the fleet, even though it was well known the U.S. fleet was newer and better equipped. What followed was one of the biggest, for the Spanish bloodiest, and most heart breaking naval battles of the 19th Century. The Spanish were simply outgunned and could not match the speed of the newer American ships. It was less a battle than turkey shoot. The Spanish fleet was utterly destroyed and thousands killed while the Americans had taken only a few spare shoots and a couple killed. It was the end of Spains almost five hundred year American Empire. Shock and consternation in Madrid soon brought the Spanish-American War to a speedy end. 1944: The Soviet Summer of Victories begins on July 3, 1944 with the liberation of Minsk.
Posted on: Tue, 01 Jul 2014 16:39:01 +0000
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