Who would win, a winged hussar or a cuirassier?
In the battles where they met, the hussars. At Kircholm in 1605 and Klushino in 1610, hussar-led Commonwealth armies routed far larger forces that included Western pistol cavalry, whose caracole could not stop a lance charge at the gallop. Western pistol cavalry, especially the more lightly armored reiters, was easier and cheaper to raise in numbers, and cuirassier regiments, though by then sword-armed and wearing only the cuirass, survived until the First World War.1
In the early seventeenth century two answers to the same question met on the battlefields of northern Europe. The West had largely given up the lance: its heavy horsemen, the cuirassiers, wore three-quarter armor and fought with a pair of wheellock pistols and a sword. The Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth kept the lance and built its army around it: the winged hussars, armored lancers who charged home at the gallop. When the two met, at Kircholm, Klushino and Trzciana, the results were among the most one-sided cavalry fights of the age.2
Head to head
| Winged hussar | Cuirassier | |
|---|---|---|
| Where | Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth3 | Western and Central Europe: the Empire, Germany, France, the Netherlands, Sweden4 |
| Heyday | From Stefan Batory's reign (from 1576) to the relief of Vienna in 16835 | Late 16th and 17th centuries, including the Thirty Years' War, 1618 to 16486 |
| Main weapon | The kopia, a hollow lance: Brzezinski gives about 4 to 5 m, a Polish state education resource 4 to 6 m7 | A pair of wheellock pistols in saddle holsters, then the sword8 |
| Other weapons | Koncerz (long thrusting sword), saber, two pistols or a carbine9 | Sword; gauntlets often left off so the hands could load pistols10 |
| Armor | Helmet, breast and back plates, arm guards; Żygulski: a full set rarely more than about 15 kg11 | Three-quarter armor covering the upper body and the legs to the knee, with boots below12 |
| Signature tactic | The charge with the lance, closing ranks just before impact, repeated if needed13 | The caracole: ranks rode up, fired and wheeled away to reload14 |
| Who paid | The companion (towarzysz) equipped himself and his retainers, often at great cost15 | Cuirassiers were wealthy men, often officers, in costly armor16 |
| Counting rule | Field battles in this article where hussar-led Commonwealth cavalry fought Western-style pistol cavalry | |
| Clashes here | Kircholm 1605, Klushino 1610 and Trzciana 1629: all three won by the Commonwealth side17 | At Trzciana imperial reiters fought on the Polish side18 |
| End | Last real battle at Kliszów in 1702; ended as a fighting force by a Sejm resolution of 177519 | Survived as armored heavy cavalry into the Napoleonic wars20 |
Key points
- Both were heavy cavalry, but the hussar was a lancer built for shock and the early cuirassier a pistoleer built for firepower.
- The three clashes covered here between hussar-led armies and Western pistol cavalry all ended in Commonwealth victories, though the wider Prussian war of 1626 to 1629 was not one-sided: Gniew was indecisive and Sweden came out ahead.
- Gustavus Adolphus, who also fought the hussars in Prussia, is often credited with turning Swedish cavalry back to the charge with the sword.
- The hussars were costly and few, their companions equipping themselves; the more lightly armored reiters of the West, often mercenaries, were easier and cheaper to recruit.21
Equipment: the lance against the pistol
The hussar's weapon was the kopia, made of two hollowed halves of fir glued together, so that even at about 5 meters it rarely weighed more than about 3 kilograms. Published lengths vary: Brzezinski gives about 4 to 5 meters, a Polish state education resource 4 to 6 meters. It usually shattered on impact, and the hussar went on with a long thrusting sword, the koncerz, or the saber, with two pistols or a short carbine in his saddle holsters.22
The cuirassier carried no lance. In the West the heavy lance had fallen out of use, and the man who gave it up became the pistol-armed cuirassier or reiter. The Victoria and Albert Museum describes his three-quarter armor as covering “the entire upper body as well as the front half of the legs down to the knee”, with boots below; gauntlets were used less and less, to keep the hands free for firearms. The museum adds that such horsemen carried expensive wheel-lock pistols in holsters at the horse's neck.23
Armor and cost
The hussar was armored, but lightly by Western standards. Zdzisław Żygulski of the National Museum in Kraków describes a helmet, breastplates of bright steel on average 3 to 5 millimeters thick and oriental-style arm guards, a full set rarely more than about 15 kilograms. Each companion, the towarzysz, brought his own small team of armed retainers, the poczet, and equipped them himself, often at great cost.25
The cuirassier's harness covered more of the body. The V&A notes that the threat of firearms pushed armorers to make cavalry armor thicker and heavier, so that by the early 17th century only cuirassiers still wore all-over armor, and calls them “wealthy officers”. In both armies, then, the heaviest cavalry was an expensive elite.26
Tactics: charge against caracole
The hussars won by shock. Polish accounts describe a charge that set out in fairly open order and closed up, at times knee to knee, only in the last stretch before contact, though Brzezinski doubts this open-order start, and companies could charge again and again: Rickard records a five hour fight at Klushino in which the Russian cavalry was broken by repeated attacks.27
The classic Western answer was the caracole. The V&A describes squadrons that “discharged pistols in unison, before doubling back” to be followed by a second line, and EBSCO notes that the short barrels of pistols made them lethal only at close range. Against a lance charge at the gallop, that was a poor bargain.28
Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden knew the hussars at first hand. In 1629, at Trzciana in Royal Prussia, his cavalry was routed by Polish-Lithuanian horse and imperial reiters, and he was nearly captured himself. EBSCO describes how his reformed cavalry learned to fire a volley and then charge with swords before the enemy could recover, restoring shock to the cavalry arm.29
Kircholm, 1605
At Kircholm near Riga on 27 September 1605, the Lithuanian hetman Jan Karol Chodkiewicz had about 3,600 men against a Swedish army under Charles IX that the Polish History Museum puts at about 11,000. A feigned retreat drew the Swedes off their hill; Rickard says the Swedish cavalry was driven off in about half an hour, leaving the infantry isolated. Swedish dead are put at 8,000 to 9,000, against Commonwealth losses of about 100 to 200. Read the full story of the Battle of Kircholm.30
Klushino, 1610
At Klushino on 4 July 1610 the clash between lance and pistol was direct. Hetman Stanisław Żółkiewski led a force of about 6,700, of whom 5,556 were hussars on Rickard's count, against about 30,000 Russians and 5,000 to 7,000 foreign mercenaries under Jacob De la Gardie. The mercenary reiters tried the caracole; the hussars charged with lance and saber and swept them away. The isolated mercenary infantry fought on until the small Polish infantry force came up in the afternoon with its two field guns, and was then driven back to its camp and forced to surrender. More in our article on the Battle of Klushino.31
Vienna, 1683: side by side
At Vienna on 12 September 1683 the two kinds of heavy cavalry fought on the same side. Late in the day Polish and imperial horsemen charged down the slopes of the Kahlenberg into the Ottoman camp, with King Jan III Sobieski at the head of the hussars. See the Battle of Vienna.32
Which was better, the winged hussar or the cuirassier?
In the clashes recorded here the hussars won every time, but with help: at Kircholm and Klushino they fought alongside infantry, guns and other cavalry, and the reiters they beat at Klushino were foreign mercenaries. Brzezinski argues that hussar victories over pikemen almost always came with help from their own infantry. Man for man in open country, the lance charge usually beat the pistol caracole.33
The cuirassier's kind still outlasted the hussar's. The Commonwealth's hussars fought their last real battle at Kliszów in 1702 and were ended as a fighting formation by a Sejm resolution of 1775, while armored cuirassiers were still charging in Napoleon's armies a generation later, and served until 1914. For more on the trade-offs, read heavy vs light cavalry, the winged hussars' greatest battles and our greatest cavalry charges in history.34
