Time Machine: The Strangest Corps of All

Following is a brief piece titled "The Strangest Corps of All, or a Throwback" that appeared in issue 4 of "The Fusilier Magazine," an undated wargaming newsletter from the late 1960s or early 1970s. 

We have all undoubtedly heard that some Confederate units were armed with pikes in the early stage of the Civil War when muskets were in short supply. Some of us might have read about Ben Franklin's recommendation in 1776 that American troops be armed with the longbow. But, how many of you have heard of the Basquiers? These Basquiers, or "the strangest corps of all" as we have termed them, stepped right out the the Dark Ages onto a Napoleonic battlefield: 

French cavalry pursuing the beaten Russian army following the Battle of Friedland (14 June 1807) were attacked by 1,500 men dressed in steel helmets and long chain mail coats. These men were armed with the ancient composite bow of the Tartars. These were the Basquiers of Tartary. Somehow word of the French invasion had drifted across the steppes and mountains to their ancient homeland, and they had marched thousands of miles to help. Fearing that the arrows were tipped with poison, the French cavalry fled. 

This little anecdote is related in Sir Robert Wilson's Brief Remarks On the Character and Composition of the Russian Army (London, 1810). Sir Robert's text will give pause for thought to those who would wish to study the logistics of moving 1,500 armored men across hundreds of miles of difficult territory. The Basquiers had no problem -- They simply ate their horses. This, of course, is not recommended for modern armies.