(1.) The enemy's flanks, if uncovered.
(2.) His infantry, when, from any cause, its attack would probably
succeed.
(3.) All detachments thrown forward without support.
6. When cavalry has routed cavalry, the victorious squadrons should at
once charge in flank _the infantry protected by the cavalry just
beaten_. The great Conde, when only twenty-two years of age, by this
means, won the victory of Rocroi.
7. Deployed as skirmishers, by their noise, dust, and smoke, cavalry may
furnish a good _screen_ for our movements.
8. Cavalry skirmishers _scout their corps_, to prevent the enemy
reconnoitring it too closely.
9. When a cavalry rear-guard has to defend, temporarily, a defile, a
bridge, or a barricade, a part should _dismount_, and use their carbines
till the rest are safe.
So, a cavalry vanguard, by its fire, dismounted, may prevent the enemy
from destroying a bridge.
In these, and in similar cases, the cavalrymen should habitually
dismount, in order to render their fire effective; acting and
manoeuvring as skirmishers.
VI.--How it Fights.
1. The success of cavalry in battle depends on the _impetuosity of its
charge_, and its _use of the sabre_. When deployed as skirmishers,
mounted or dismounted, its proper weapon is the carbine or pistol; and
in individual combats, these weapons may occasionally be very useful.
But when acting as cavalry proper, in any compact formation, it must
rely on the sabre. The aim with a pistol or carbine in the hands of a
mounted man is so unsteady, that the fire of a line of cavalry is
generally ineffective; and there are few occasions where it should be
resorted to. When cavalry has learned to realize that these are not its
true arms, and that it is never really formidable but when it closes
with the enemy at full speed and with uplifted sabre, it has acquired
the most important element of its efficiency.
2. Cavalry should, therefore, not fight _in columns_, as most of its
sabres would thereby become useless. But if a facing about to retreat is
feared, an attack in column would prevent it. It is said, also, that a
column is more imposing than a line. If so, it might have a greater
moral effect on the enemy.
3. When cavalry are deployed as skirmishers, as a curtain to hide our
movements, they should be _in considerable number_, with small
intervals, and should make as much noise, and smoke, and dust as
possible. When the charge is sounded, the skirmishers wait and fall in
with the rest.
4. The great rule in cavalry combats is to _cover our own flanks_, and
_gain the enemy's_; for these are his and our weakest points.
5. When the enemy's cavalry is already in full charge on our infantry,
it is too late for our cavalry to charge it with much prospect of
success. In such a case, it would be better to defer our own charge till
the moment that the enemy's _is completed_; for our success then would
be certain.
6. Cavalry attacks cavalry _in line_, in order to have the more sabres,
and, if possible, to outflank the enemy.
7. If we can manoeuvre so as to attack the enemy's cavalry _in flank_,
our success will be certain.
Military history affords hundreds of instances in proof of this
proposition. At one of the battles in Spain, for example, in 1809,
fifteen hundred French horse, by charging four thousand Spanish cavalry
in flank, completely cut it in pieces.
8. Cavalry _never waits in position_ to be charged by cavalry. Its only
safety is in meeting the charge with a violent gallop; it would
otherwise be sure to be overthrown.
When hostile cavalries thus meet each other, there is usually but small
loss on either side. A certain number of troopers are usually
dismounted; but the colliding masses somehow ride through each other,
allowing but little time for the exchange of points and cuts.
Thus cavalry can defend itself against cavalry only by attacking; which
it must do even when inferior to the enemy in number.
9. To attack artillery, cavalry should be in _three detachments_;
one-fourth to seize the guns; one-half to charge the supports; and the
other fourth as a reserve.
The first party attacks in dispersed order, as foragers, trying to gain
the flanks of the battery. The second party should manoeuvre to gain
the flanks of the supports.
10. Where a cavalry attack can be masked, so as to operate _as a
surprise_, a battery may be taken by charging it in front. The
formidable Spanish battery in the Pass of Somosierra, was finally
carried by a dash of Napoleon's Polish Lancers upon it, suddenly
profiting of a temporary fog or mist. But, in ordinary cases, when
cavalry has to charge a battery in front, its fire should be drawn by
our own guns or infantry, immediately before the charge begins.
11. In an attack on an _intrenchment_, the office of cavalry can rarely
be any thing else than to repulse sorties from the work, and to cut off
the enemy's retreat from it.
VII.--Its Charge.
1. As cavalry acts effectively on the field of battle only by its
charge, good cavalry of the line can be formed in no other way than by
being _exercised in this_, its special and peculiar function.
On taking command of the Army of Italy in 1796, Bonaparte found the
French cavalry to be entirely worthless. They had never been accustomed
to charge, and he had the greatest difficulty in making them engage.
Seeing the great importance of this arm, he determined to make good
cavalry of them by compelling them to fight. So, in his attack on
Borghetto, he sent his cavalry forward, with his grenadiers on their
flanks, and his artillery close behind them. Thus enclosed, and led on
by Murat to the charge, they attacked and routed that famous Austrian
cavalry whose superiority they had so much dreaded. This was the first
step in the formation of the splendid French cavalry to which Napoleon
afterwards owed so many of his victories. And, at the battle of
Hochstedt, on the Danube, in 1801, its superiority over the Austrian
cavalry was, at last, completely established.