Post by Hobo Joe on Oct 26, 2021 16:03:56 GMT
I made a very small thread a long time ago on my old Account about this splendid time in Austria's mighty history, but it was nearly no effort and didn't encapsulate the full "wtf" of the tale.
The Battle of Karansebes took place around the town of Caransebeศ, on the 21st night of September.
As was typical of the time, a considerable portion of the Austrian army was sent to march ahead as a scouting force in attempt to discover the Ottoman army. The vanguard scout of the army, a contingent of Hussars, discovered a camp of wandering Romani (I imagine we're not allowed to use the G word here), who proceeded to sell the Hussars large amounts of schnapps.
A group of infantry from the main Army, also sent as scouts, discovered the Hussars having a wonderful party, and demanded themselves to be invited and given the schnapps. The Hussars, in their complete maturity, said "No!" and proceeded to build a makeshift fort to keep the infantry out, until finally a shot was fired.
And like in most cases of a random shot going off in a heated argument during the Age of Revolutions, utter chaos (and hilarity) ensues.
A panicked man shouts "Turci! Turci!" (Turks! Turks!), causing the Hussars to leave in panic. Now, Austria was a disturbingly massive country filled with ethnic diversity, and most of the Army didn't speak German, but their local languages, like Italian or Croatian, meaning:
Nobody knew what in tarnation was going on.
Panic spread like wildfire as the German officers rode hard, shouting "Halt! Halt!" in a desperate attempt to get everyone to just calm down. The soldiers, somehow, mistook this for Turkish soldiers yelling "Allah! Allah!", and began firing on them (and, each other.)
Everyone was firing upon everyone, jumping at everything and shooting at whatever that moved, causing further chaos as more and more Austrian soldiers die, it had seemed that this invisible Ottoman force was everywhere.
The Battle of Karansebes took place around the town of Caransebeศ, on the 21st night of September.
As was typical of the time, a considerable portion of the Austrian army was sent to march ahead as a scouting force in attempt to discover the Ottoman army. The vanguard scout of the army, a contingent of Hussars, discovered a camp of wandering Romani (I imagine we're not allowed to use the G word here), who proceeded to sell the Hussars large amounts of schnapps.
A group of infantry from the main Army, also sent as scouts, discovered the Hussars having a wonderful party, and demanded themselves to be invited and given the schnapps. The Hussars, in their complete maturity, said "No!" and proceeded to build a makeshift fort to keep the infantry out, until finally a shot was fired.
And like in most cases of a random shot going off in a heated argument during the Age of Revolutions, utter chaos (and hilarity) ensues.
A panicked man shouts "Turci! Turci!" (Turks! Turks!), causing the Hussars to leave in panic. Now, Austria was a disturbingly massive country filled with ethnic diversity, and most of the Army didn't speak German, but their local languages, like Italian or Croatian, meaning:
Nobody knew what in tarnation was going on.
Panic spread like wildfire as the German officers rode hard, shouting "Halt! Halt!" in a desperate attempt to get everyone to just calm down. The soldiers, somehow, mistook this for Turkish soldiers yelling "Allah! Allah!", and began firing on them (and, each other.)
Everyone was firing upon everyone, jumping at everything and shooting at whatever that moved, causing further chaos as more and more Austrian soldiers die, it had seemed that this invisible Ottoman force was everywhere.
To make matters worse, the Hussars apparently fled so hard, to the rear camp, it had looked like a cavalry charge by the Ottomans, causing the camp to fire their artillery at the Hussars, waking up the entire camp, recruiting more unsuspecting soldiers into the chaos. Most fled in a panic.
As the fighting died down, the Austrian army would desperately flee, being badly beaten by... the Austrian army. When the Ottomans arrive, they saw drunkenly made makeshift fortifications, a field of dead Austrians, lots of alcohol, and a completely unprotected city to occupy.
This remains in history as one of the most bizarre "battles" to exist, and will always stand out as a reason to...
You know what, there's absolutely no lesson to be learned here. Sometimes people just do a silly, and a lot of people die as a result.
This "battle", if you can even call it that, let to the loss of lives of 150 men, and the wounding of 1200, with nearly 600 just gone missing, never to be seen again.
Oh, and someone looted the entire war chest during the chaos, presumably one of the missing. Which is, just absolutely hilarious. Man had his priorities straight.
