People's Pilot, Volume 2, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 February 1893 — FIFTEEN DECISIVE BATTLES. [ARTICLE]

FIFTEEN DECISIVE BATTLES.

Some of the Great Events Which Changed the Map of the World. According to Lord Creasy, the fifteen decisive battles were those at Marathon, September, 490 B. C., when Miltiades, with 10,000 Greeks, defeated 100,000 Persians under Datis and Artaphemes; at Syracuse, September, 413 B. C., a great naval battle took place, the Athenians under Nicias and Demosthenes being defeated with a loss of 40,000 killed and wounded of their entire fleet; at Arbela, October, 331 B. C., Alexander the Great overthrew Darius Codomanus for the third time; at Mataurus, 207 B. C., the Consuls Livius and Nero cut to pieces Hasdrubal’s army sent to reinforce Hannibal; Arminus, in 9 A. D., and the Gauls overthrew the Romans under Varus and established the independence of Gaul; at Chalons, 451 A. D., Actius and Therodrio utterly defeated Attila and prevented Europe from devastation; at Tours, October, 732, Charles Martel overthrew the Saracens under Abderrahman and broke the Moslem yoke from Europe; at Hastings, October, 1066, William of Normandy slew Harold II. and obtained England’s throne; at Orleans, 1429, Joan of Arc secured the independence of France; the defeat of the Spanish armada, 1588 destroyed the hopes of the pope in England; the battle of Blenheim, August 13, 1704, when Marlborough and Prince Eugene defeated Tallard, leading the French and the Bavarians, and thus preventing Louis XIV. from carrying out his schemes; at Pultowa, July, 1709, Czar Peter utterly defeated Charles XII., of Sweden, and established the Muscovite power; at Saratoga, October, 1777, Gen. Gates defeated the British and Gen. Burgoyne and thus secured for the United States the alliance of France; at Valmy, September, 1792, the French marshal, Kellerman, gained the upper hand for the French revolutionists over the duke of Brunswick and the allied armies; at Waterloo, June 18, 1815, Napoleon Bonaparte commanded the French and the duke of Wellington the British and their allies, and the victory broke up Napoleon’s revolutionary plans. Two recent battles, not hero included, are those at Gettysburg, July, 1863, and at Sedan, preparing, respectively, for the downfall of the confederacy and the capture of Napoleon II. and his army.