Small armies which changed history

Battle of the Hacienda (aka Battle of Cameroune).

65 members of the French Foriegn Legion were trapped in the Hacienda of Cameroune by a Mexican force of 1200 or so cavalry, some Mexican infantry turned up later to make it 2000)ish) against 65.

The legionnaires held out for over twelve hours despite having no water, no food and limited ammunition. When their ammunition ran out the remaining unwounded legionnaires fixed bayonets and charged the Mexicans.

This is the battle where la Legion d'Etranger made its bones...........

How much small?

Second Battle of İnönü   15.000 Turk-30.000 Greek, Turkish Victory
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Battle_of_%C4%B0n%C3%B6n%C3%BC

Battle of Marathon. 10,000 Greeks vs ~50,000 Persians

Chief Joseph and his band.  A little over 800 vs. 2000 plus of the best the US Army could put in the field.His efforts tho in the end fail.... He, ntl becomes a legend. And forces a re-examination of  BIA affairs....as usual.... later ignored. Sherman calls him the 'Red Napoleon'.The brothers in Idaho and on the Anadarko still chant to his memory.

During the First Matabele War, 50 British troops defeated a force of 5,000 Ndebele warriors. This was however due mainly to the first real deployment and use of the maxim, but this small band of soldiers created a psychological myth that exists to this day.

The small amount of Texian soldiers at the Battle of the Alamo

and again

the less than 1K soldiers of Texians at the Battle of San Jacinto

The "stars of Eger" 3000 Hungarian vs. 200,000 Turkish.

Originally posted by benzin And of course the battle of Nandorfehervar at 1456, where 20,000 Hungarian led by Janos Hunyadi beat 70,000 Türkish led by sultan Mehmed II. and defended Europe from the Ottoman Invasion.

Was it battle or siege (Siege of Belgrade-1456)?

I'm not convinced by some of the submissions so far. Here's why:

Battle of the Hacienda (aka Battle of Cameroune). The Alamo. The Siege of Eger

Sure, small armies displayed tremendous courage here against larger forces, (and in the case of Eger, which almost shouldn't be here, a victory) but neither can claim to have "changed history" very much. There wasn't much consequence to these battles. Indeed, even after Eger, Hungary remained thrice divided.

Battle of Marathon. 10,000 Greeks vs ~50,000 Persians battle of Nandorfehervar

Last time I checked, 10-20,000 isn't exactly a small army. It might be small comparatively to their foes, but its not even dramatically smaller in that context.

The rest seem okay to me. I might raise issue against Battle of Preveza, since it was overturned almost completely by Lepanto merely ~30 years later, a battle that had a much more lasting historical impact, but I'm not a fan of historical determinism, so I'll let them have this one.







Edited by ConradWeiser - 08-Nov-2011 at 17:37

I guess in comparison to many of those they took on, Genghis Khan's Mongolian army was small, and very successful.