King of German Mercenaries

After setting a plan to expand the army by 10,000, in addition to selecting 200 young people for the training of reserve officers in China, Marin also sent Schwartz, and 50 experienced team captains and 10 reserve captains ( Are all wandering knights), specializing in the training of the new army.

However, Schwartz and others did not rush directly to the Teutonic country, but first went south and recruited troops in the south of Germany ...

Because of the need to recruit 10,000 troops, it is difficult to do so in a Teutonic country with only 300,000 people. Moreover, the Teutonic state is a relatively wealthy Hansa commercial country. In such a country, it is very difficult to recruit 10,000 mercenaries who dare to bet their lives.

Of course, the Teutonic country also has its advantages, that is, there are many homeless knights there. Because the Teutonic Knights is one of the three famous knights in the Christian world, there are many young German homeless knights who come to visit each year, with an average of several hundred people each year.

Alas, the Teutonic state never lacks a knight. There are more than 800 Teutonic knights with identity and the title of "Teutonic Knights". There are thousands of knights without the title of "Teutonic Knights". In the Battle of Glenwald (also known as the Battle of Tannenberg) that led to the decline of the Teutonic State, the plateau knights alone in the 27,000 troops of the Teutonic State had tens of thousands. people. Of course, their enemies Poland and Lithuania have more troops.

After the defeat of the Battle of Grunwald, the Teutonic state began to decline, and it was no longer able to maintain the size of plate heavy cavalry of more than 10,000. But anyway, it can still maintain the scale of five thousand plate armor. Among them, there are more than 800 Teutonic knights alone.

Because of the decline of national strength, the Teutonic state cannot hire enough stray knights. Therefore, at present, the Teutonic State can only select particularly outstanding ones from the hundreds of homeless knights who come over each year to add to the Teutonic State's army. Most stray knights, in fact, have no chance.

Many young wandering knights came to Teutonic with dreams, but after a few years, many people would be disappointed to find that they could not join the Teutonic Knights. As a result, many old wandering knights will give up their dreams and return to the German area to find a nobleman. Even some homeless knights went directly to Poland or Lithuania. There are also some who will go to the nominally dependent state of the Teutonic State, the State of the Knights of Livonia, to find opportunities.

Therefore, Marin only recruited 9,000 infantry and artillery in the German area. Then, 1000 positions were left for recruiting cavalry in situ in Teutonic.

You know, there are thousands of stray knights who can't wait for a chance in Teutonic country. Previously, the head of Philip had recruited 1,000 people because he had a stake in the salt trade in Marin. However, the head of Philip estimates that there are still two or three thousand wandering knights who have not waited for a chance. It was no problem for Marin to choose 1,000 Rangers in the Teutonic state.

Although these wandering knights may not be smart, the knight martial arts are better than those picked by the Teutonic country. However, after all, they are from the Cavaliers family, and their horse fighting ability is at least much better than those civilians who have not been trained. You know, these wandering knights have trained for at least ten years, and the martial arts will certainly not be worse. By organizing these eliminated wandering knights and eliminating bad dregs, you can form an elite cavalry.

Moreover, Marin was ready, and did not plan to form pure plate armor knights, but decided to transform them into heavy cavalry similar to the Polish wing cavalry.

This cavalry only wears half body armor, and the horse is not armored. Its impact is stronger than the light cavalry and weaker than the heavy cavalry. However, their speed and stamina are better than those of the Plate Knights. It can be said that the wing cavalry is a compromise between the plate armour and the light cavalry. When fighting, their names were called Lancers ...

She Marin plans to choose 1,000 troops to test the power. In addition, Marin also chose a tactic for these Lancers-"Wall Charge".

This tactic is extremely powerful against cavalry in the skirmish line. Because, the dense cavalry formation can let more spears on the enemy. Even if the enemy is no matter how good martial arts, if faced with the multiple spears poking over, they will be dismounted, and then trampled by local war horses ...

If there is a light cavalry on the opposite side, let alone die, and you will be trampled by the war horse when you die ...

Of course, this tactic is also suitable for playing European cavalry and Arab cavalry. Because, whether it is European cavalry or Arab cavalry, they are used to solving problems with melee.

But if the "wall-style charge" is taken to East and Central Asia, it will definitely be abused by the Mongolian and Tatar archers to call their mothers. Because, the "wall charge" is not fast overall. If the lightly mounted bow cavalry flees while returning to shoot arrows, it will definitely kill these heavy cavalry who launched the "wall charge". After all, their warhorses and lower bodies have no armor and cannot withstand bows and arrows ...

Alas, Marin never thought of using Lancers and Wall Charges in Asia. After all, Marin's current opponents are basically Europeans. European cavalry are used to melee, either using lances or sabers, but they are not used to using bows and arrows or muskets. At present, the only cavalry unit in Europe that uses muskets is Marin's "Black Shirt Knight" ...

As for the 9,000 infantry ~ www.readwn.com ~ Schwartz will take his men to recruit in the poor countries of southern Germany. However, when Schwartz rushed to Württemberg and Alsace with his men, he found that there were not many young people eligible for recruitment ...

It's no wonder that Marin has recruited 10,000 troops in these two places before, so that these two regions have no shortage of hard-to-reach poor youths.

In desperation, Schwartz sent a quick letter to Marin, explaining the situation ...

Marin thought for a while, and also felt that the troop resources in the two places were indeed insufficient. So he wrote back to Schwartz and asked him to move to the vassal states of Baden and Hesse around Württemberg to recruit new recruits.

The Baden-Baden area and the Hesse area are both mountainous areas with many mountain people and poor economic performance. Therefore, it is still easy to recruit poor mountain people in these two countries. What's more, Marin knew that hessen was a famous mercenary country in later generations. During the North American War of Independence, the British employed a large number of Hesse mercenaries to suppress the North American militia because of the inability of the Army. Had it not been for the French ’s forcible interference and Washington ’s use of land to seduce poor Hessian mercenaries (Washington promised that each Hessian mercenary who was on a small margin would receive 50 acres of land), the British would be able to suppress it with the help of Hessian mercenaries North American Independence Movement.

In this way, under the direction of Marin, Schwartz transferred the recruiting agencies to the Hessen and Baden areas, and began to recruit local poor and combative mountain people to serve as new mercenary fighters.

It happened that Marin sent his men who bought commercial ships in Lubeck and other places to return, and brought back 10 200-ton Kirk sailing ships. After waiting for the 9,000 infantry to arrive in East Friesland in batches, they were directly shipped to the Teutonic country, where they were trained rigorously ...