Part 7

=Ascalon= (Syria). A city of the Philistines which shared the fate of Phœnicia and Judea. The Egyptian army was defeated here by the Crusaders under Godfrey of Bouillon, August 12, 1099; it was besieged by the latter in 1148, taken in 1153, and again in 1191. Its fortifications were destroyed through fear of the Crusaders, by the sultan, in 1270.

=Aschaffenburg.= On the Maine, Bavaria, Southwestern Germany; here, on July 14, 1866, the Prussians defeated the German Federal army, captured the town, and took 2000 prisoners.

=Asculum= (now _Ascoli_, Apulia, Southern Italy). Near it Pyrrhus of Epirus defeated the Romans 279 B.C. Asculum, a city of the Piceni, with all their country, was conquered by the Consul Sempronius 268 B.C. Andrea, general of the Emperor Henry VI., endeavoring to wrest Naples from Tancred, was defeated and slain in 1190.

=Ashantees.= Warlike negroes of West Africa. In 1807 they conquered Fantee, in which the British settlement of Cape Coast Castle is situated. On the death of their king, who had been friendly to the English, hostilities began; and on January 21, 1824, the Ashantees defeated about 1000 British under Sir Charles McCarthy at Accra, and brought away his skull with others as trophies. They were totally defeated August 27, 1826, by Col. Purdon. The governor of Cape Coast Castle began a war with them in the spring of 1863; but the British troops suffered much through disease, and the war was suspended by the government in May, 1864.

=Ashburton Treaty.= Concluded at Washington, August 9, 1842, by Alexander, Lord Ashburton, and John Tyler, President of the United States; it defined the boundaries of the respective countries between Canada and Maine, settled the extradition of criminals, etc.

=Ashdod=, or =Azotus=. An ancient city of Judea, identified with the site of the modern _Asdood_, about 12 miles northeast of Ascalon. It is celebrated by Herodotus as having stood a siege of 29 years from Psammatichus, king of Egypt (about 630 B.C.). It was taken by the Assyrians under Tartan, the general of Sennacherib (713 B.C.); taken and destroyed by Judas Maccabæus and his brother Jonathan; restored by Gabinius, and given by Augustus to Salome.

=Ashdown=, or =Assendune=. Now thought to be Ashton, Berks, England, where Ethelred and his brother Alfred defeated the Danes in 1171.

=Asia Minor.= See ANATOLIA.

=Askeri Mohammedize.= A name given to the Turkish regular troops organized according to modern tactics.

=Aslant.= Formed or placed in an oblique line.

=Asow.= An old fortified city in Southern Russia. Towards the end of the 14th century it fell into the hands of Timur; the Turks took possession of it in 1471; captured by the Cossacks in 1637; besieged without success by the Turks in 1641, they returned the following year with a large army to attack the city, when the Cossacks, thinking it impossible to hold the city against such a force, plundered and burned it; the Turks then rebuilt the city and fortified it; it was surrendered to Peter the Great in 1696; the city again came into the Turkish possession after the peace treaty on the Pruth. In the war between Turkey and Russia, Asow was besieged by Field-Marshal Munich; it surrendered to Gen. Lascy, July 4, 1736.

=Aspe.= A village in the department of the Lower Pyrenees, France, where a small detachment of the French army defeated 6000 Spaniards in 1792.

=Aspect.= An army is said to hold a menacing aspect, when by advanced movements or positions it gives the opposing enemy cause to apprehend an attack. A country is said to have a military aspect, when its general situation presents appropriate obstacles or facilities for an army acting on the offensive or defensive. An army is said to have an imposing aspect, when it appears stronger than it really is. This appearance is often assumed for the purpose of deceiving an enemy, and may not improperly be considered as a principal _ruse de guerre_, or feint in war.

=Aspern, Great.= A town near the Danube and Vienna, where a series of desperate conflicts took place between the Austrian army under the Archduke Charles, and the French under Napoleon, Massena, etc., on May 21-22, 1809, ending in the retreat of Napoleon on May 22. The loss of the former exceeded 20,000 men, and of the latter 30,000. The daring Marshal Lannes was mortally wounded on May 22, and died May 31. The bridge of the Danube was destroyed and Napoleon’s retreat endangered; but the success of the Austrians had no beneficial effect on the subsequent prosecution of the war.

=Aspic= (_Fr._). An ancient piece of ordnance which carried a 12-pound shot; the piece itself was 11 feet long, and weighed 4250 pounds.

=Aspis.= A large, round, or oblong shield which was used by the heavy infantry of the ancient Grecians.

=Aspromonte= (Naples). Here Garibaldi was defeated, wounded, and taken prisoner, August 29, 1862, having injudiciously risen against the French occupation of Rome.

=Assagai=, or =Assegai=. An instrument of warfare among the Kaffirs.

=Assail.= To attack with violence, or in a hostile manner; to assault, etc. See ATTACK.

=Assailable.= Capable of being assailed, attacked, or invaded.

=Assas-Bachi.= A superior officer of janissaries, who was also administrator of the police department in Constantinople, and presided over public executions.

=Assassins=, or =Assassinians=. Fanatical Mohammedans, collected by Hassan-ben-Sabah, and settled in Persia about 1090. In Syria they possessed a large tract of land among the mountains of Lebanon. They murdered the Marquis of Montferrat in 1192, Louis of Bavaria in 1213, and the Khan of Tartary in 1254. They were extirpated in Persia about 1258, and in Syria about 1272. The chief of the corps was named “Old Man of the Mountain.” They trained up young people to assassinate such persons as their chief had devoted to destruction. From them the word _assassin_ has been derived.

=Assault.= A furious but regulated effort to carry a fortified post, camp, or fortress by personal attack, uncovered and unsupported. While an assault during a siege continues, the batteries of the besiegers cease, lest the attacking party should be injured. The party which leads the assault is sometimes called “the forlorn hope.”

=Assaye.= A small town in the province of Bahar, in the Deccan, celebrated for a battle fought in 1803, between the British army, 4500 strong, under the Duke of Wellington, then Gen. Wellesley, and the confederated armies of India, numbering 50,000 troops; the latter were completely routed, leaving 1200 dead on the field, with nearly the whole of their artillery. Such was the battle of Assaye, which established the fame of the greatest commander of the age, and fixed the dominion of Britain over prostrate India.

=Asseerghur.= A strong hill fortress, situated about 12 miles northerly and easterly from Burhampoor, India. It was taken from the Mahrattas by the British on two occasions; the first time in 1803, and finally in 1819.

=Asseguay.= The knife-dagger used in the Levant.

=Assembly.= A beat of the drum or sound of the bugle as a signal to troops to assemble.

=Assens.= A maritime town of Denmark on the island of Funen; here Christian III. defeated his insurgent subjects in 1535.

=Asser.= An instrument of warfare used by the Romans on their war ships; it consisted of a heavy pole with an iron head, and was used as a battering-ram against hostile ships. Other authorities assert that it was used to destroy the rigging only.

=Assessment of Damages.= In the English army, is the determination by a committee of officers of the value of the injury done to the barracks each month, in order that stoppages in liquidation may be made from men who have committed the damage.

=Assidui Milites.= Roman soldiers who served in the army without receiving pay.

=Assignment.= If, upon marches, guards, or in quarters, different corps of the army shall happen to join or do duty together, the officer highest in rank of the line of the army, marine corps, or militia, by commission, there on duty or in quarters, shall command the whole, and give orders for what is needful to the service, unless otherwise specially directed by the President of the United States, according to the nature of the case. See APPENDIX, ARTICLES OF WAR, 122.

=Assignment of Pay.= By a non-commissioned officer or private, previous to discharge, is invalid. A transfer subsequent to the discharge is valid.

=Assinaries=, or =Assinaires=. Festivals which were instituted at Syracuse, in commemoration of the destruction of the Athenian fleet commanded by Nicias and Demosthenes.

=Assinarus= (now _Falunara_). A small river in Sicily, near which the army of Nicias and Demosthenes was defeated 413 B.C.

=Assistant.= In the English army, is the third grade in any particular branch of the staff, such as the quartermaster-general’s or adjutant-general’s. After the principal comes the deputy and then the assistant. In the United States it is the second grade in the staff branches of the army.

=Assyria.= A name which is usually appropriated to the first of what are known as the four great empires of the world, but which in geography nearly corresponds with the modern Koordistan. Its capital was Nineveh, of which the ancient ruins may still be traced. In 625 B.C., Nineveh was destroyed by Cyaxares the Mede, and Assyria became a province of Media.

=Astapa= (now _Estepa_). A city in the province of Seville, Spain; it was besieged by the Romans under Marius; the besieged slew their women and children and allowed themselves to be cut down to a man before they would surrender to the Romans.

=Asta-Regia.= A city of Spain (now in ruins); near here the prætor Caius Atinius gained a victory over the ancient Lusitanians, in 186 B.C.

=Asti=, or =Asta=. A city in Piedmont, Italy. Chevert took its fortress in 1745.

=Astorga= (anc. _Asturica Augusta_). A city in Spain, which was taken by the French in 1810.

=Astragal and Fillets=. Are the mouldings at the front end of the chase, used in the ornamental work of ordnance.

=Astrakhan= (Southeast Russia). Capital of a province of the same name; it was captured by the Russians in 1554; besieged by the Turks in 1569, who were defeated with great slaughter; seized by the rebel Stenko Razin in 1670, who was soon dispossessed of it by his uncle Jacolof. The province was visited and settled by Peter the Great in 1722.

=Astrolabe.= An instrument for observing the position of the stars, now disused. A graduated ring with sights for taking altitudes at sea was also formerly so called.

=Asturias.= An ancient principality in Northwest Spain. Here Pelayo collected the Gothic fugitives, about 713, founded a new kingdom, and by his victories checked Moorish conquests. In 1808 the junta of Asturias began the organized resistance to the French usurpation.

=Asylum, Royal Military.= A benevolent institution erected at Chelsea, Middlesex, England, for the reception and education of the children of soldiers of the regular army. The first stone was laid by the Duke of York, June 19, 1801. The direction and control of the institution are placed in the hands of commissioners appointed by her majesty, the principals of which are the commander-in-chief, the secretary of war, the master-general of the ordnance, and other high officials connected with the government. In the selection of children for admission preference, in general, is given:--First, to orphans; second, to those whose fathers have been killed, or have died on foreign service; third, to those who have lost their mothers, and whose fathers are absent on duty abroad; fourth, to those whose fathers are ordered on foreign service, or whose parents have other children to maintain. There is also a branch establishment at Southampton, for the maintenance and education of girls.

=Asylum, Military.= See SOLDIERS’ HOMES.

=As You Were.= A word of command corresponding to the French _remettez vous_, frequently used by drill instructors to cause a resumption of the previous position, when any motion of the musket or movement of the body has been improperly made.

=Atabal.= A kettle-drum; a kind of tabor, used by the Moors.

=Ataghan.= See YATAGHAN.

=Ataman.= A hetman, or chief of the Cossacks.

=Atchevement.= In heraldry, is a term nearly equivalent to arms, or armorial bearings, and is often used in its abbreviated form of _hatchment_ when speaking of the arms of a deceased person as displayed at his funeral or elsewhere.

=Ategar.= The old English hand-dart, named from the Saxon _aeton_, “to fling,” and _gar_, “a weapon.”

=Ategna.= An important city of ancient Italy. It was taken from the Republicans by Julius Cæsar, in 45 B.C.

=Atella= (now _San Arpino_). A place in Italy, where the French under the Duke of Montpensier, general of Charles VIII., had to capitulate and surrender to Ferdinand II. of Naples, in 1496. The prisoners were transported to the island of Procida, where the majority of them, including the Duke of Montpensier, perished by contracting an infectious disease.

=Ath.= A fortified town in Belgium; it was ceded to France in 1668; fortified by Vauban; restored to the Spaniards in 1678; captured by the French under Marshal Catinat in 1697, but was restored in the same year by the peace of Ryswick. The allies under Field-Marshal d’Auvergne took it October 1, 1706. It remained in the possession of the Dutch till 1716, when it was given up to the emperor of Austria, with the remainder of the Spanish Netherlands. Louis XV. of France captured it in 1745. France lost it by the treaties of 1814-15.

=Athanati.= A corps of picked soldiers belonging to the ancient Persian army, 10,000 strong, which were called the “Immortals,” for the reason that, as soon as one of the corps died, another was put in his place.

=Athenry.= A town in Galway, Ireland; near here the Irish were totally defeated, and a gallant young chief, Feidlim O’Connor, slain in 1316.

=Athens.= A celebrated city, the capital of the modern kingdom of Greece, situated in the plain of Attica, about 4 miles northeast of the Gulf of Ægina. It was for several ages the centre of European civilization. The city is said to have been founded by Cecrops, and afterwards enlarged by Theseus, who made it the capital of the new state which he formed by uniting into one political body the 12 independent states into which Attica had previously been divided. A new era in the history of the city commences with its capture by Xerxes, who reduced it almost to a heap of ashes, 480 B.C. This event was followed by the rapid development of the maritime power of the city and the establishment of her empire over the islands of the Ægean Sea. Her increasing wealth afforded her ample means for the embellishment of the city, and during the half century which elapsed between the battle of Salamis and the commencement of the Peloponnesian war, the Athenians erected those masterpieces of architecture which have been the wonder of succeeding ages. The city was captured by the Lacedæmonians in 404 B.C., and was conquered by Sulla, the Roman general, 86 B.C., after which it dwindled into insignificance as a maritime city. Its prosperity continued, however, under the Roman sway, and it continued to be famous as the centre of philosophy, literature, and art, many famous buildings having been erected there by foreign rulers after the decline of its power. During the Middle Ages it sunk into insignificance. It has successively belonged to the Goths, Byzantines, Bergundians, Franks, Catalans, Florentines, Venetians, and Turks. In 1687 the buildings of the Acropolis suffered severe injury in the siege of Athens by the Venetians under Morosini. In 1834 Athens was declared the capital of the kingdom of Greece.

=Athlone.= A town in Roscommon, Ireland, which was burnt during the civil war in 1641. After the battle of the Boyne, Col. R. Grace held Athlone for James II. against a besieging army, but fell when it was taken by assault by Ginkel, June 30, 1691. See AUGHRIM.

=Atilt.= In the manner of a tilter; in the position or with the action of a man making a thrust. “To run a tilt at men.”

=Atlanta.= A city of Fulton Co., Ga., and the capital of the State. In its vicinity a battle was fought between the Federal forces under Gen. Sherman and the Confederates under Gen. Hood, July 22, 1864. The city was taken by Gen. Sherman on September 2, and held by him until November 15, when he set out on his famous “march to the sea.”

=Atmidometer=, or =Admometer=. An instrument for measuring the rate of evaporation, used in English medical corps.

=Atrebates.= A Belgic people subdued by Cæsar, 57 B.C.

=Attach.= To place, to appoint. Officers and non-commissioned officers are said to be attached to the respective army, regiment, battalion, troop, or company with which they are appointed to act.

=Attache= (_Fr._). The seal and signature of the colonel-general in the old French service, which were affixed to commissions of officers after they had been duly examined.

=Attack.= Any general assault or onset that is given to gain a post or break a body of troops. _False attack_, a feigned or secondary movement in the arrangements of an assault, intended to divert the attention of an enemy from the real or principal attack. Such a movement has been sometimes converted into a real attack, and succeeded when the main assault, to which it was intended to be subsidiary, had failed. _Attack of a siege_ is a furious attack made by the besiegers by means of trenches, galleries, saps, breaches, or mines, etc., by storming any part of the front attack. _To attack in front or flank_, in fortifications, means to attack the salient angle, or both sides of the bastion.

=Attack and Defense.= A part of the sword exercise drill.

=Attacking.= The act of making a general assault or onset for the capture of a post, fort, etc., or the breaking of a body of troops. Previous to an assault on a fortified position, the artillery ought to support the other troops by a combined fire of guns, howitzers, and small mortars, so that, if possible, the fire may be simultaneous, as such diversity of projectiles would tend to distract the defenders, and prevent them from extinguishing any fires among buildings, besides throwing them into confusion at the moment of assault. In cases of surprise, when immediate action is required, this method cannot, of course, be practicable.

=Attention.= A cautionary command addressed to troops preparatory to a particular exercise or manœuvre. _Gare-a-vous_ has the same signification in the French service.

=Attestation.= In the English service, is a certificate which is granted by a justice of the peace within four days after the enlistment of a recruit. This certificate bears testimony that the recruit has been brought before the justice in conformity to the Mutiny Act, and has declared his assent or dissent to such enlistment, and that (if according to the said act he shall have been duly enlisted) the proper oaths have been administered to him by the magistrate, and the sections of the articles of war against mutiny and desertion read to the said recruit.

=Audenarde.= See OUDENARDE.

=Auditor, Second.= An official connected with the Treasury Department, whose duties consist in examining all accounts relating to the pay and clothing of the army, the subsistence of officers, bounties, premiums, military and hospital stores, and the contingent expenses of the War Department, etc., and transmitting them with vouchers, etc., to the Second Comptroller for his decision.

=Auditor, Third.= To him is assigned the duty of examining all accounts relative to the subsistence of the army, the quartermaster’s department, and generally all accounts of the War Department other than those provided for; also all accounts relating to pensions, claims for compensation for loss of horses and equipments of officers and enlisted men in the military service of the United States, etc.

=Auditor, Fourth.= Examines all accounts accruing in the Navy Department, or relative thereto, and all accounts relating to navy pensions.

=Auerstadt= (Prussia). Here and at Jena, on October 4, 1806, the French signally defeated the Prussians. See JENA.

=Auget.= A kind of small trough used in mining, in which the saucisson or train-hose is laid in straw, to prevent the powder from contracting any dampness.

=Aughrim.= Near Athlone, in Ireland, where, on July 12, 1691, a battle was fought between the Irish, headed by the French general St. Ruth, and the English, under Gen. Ginkel. The former were defeated and lost 7000 men; the latter lost only 600 killed and 960 wounded. St. Ruth was slain. This engagement proved decisively fatal to the interests of James II., and Ginkel was created earl of Athlone.

=Augusta.= A city and capital of Richmond Co., Ga., on the Savannah River. It was an important place at the time of the Revolution, and was captured by the English and Tories in 1779, but surrendered to Col. Henry Lee, of the Revolutionary army, June 5, 1781.

=Augusta=, or =Agosta=. A well-built and fortified city in the intendancy of Catania, in Sicily; near here, on April 21, 1676, a naval battle was fought between the French under Duquesne, and the Dutch and Spanish fleet under Ruyter, the advantage remaining with the French. Ruyter was wounded at this battle, and died a few days after at Syracuse.

=Augusticum.= A bounty that was given by the Roman emperors to their soldiers upon the latter taking the oath of allegiance for the first time, or upon a renewal of the oath.

=Aulic Council.= A term applied to a council of the War Department of the Austrian empire, and the members of different provincial chanceries of that empire are called aulic councillors.

=Aumacor.= A title similar to general-in-chief, which was given to the chief of the Saracens during the Crusades.

=Ausen.= A name given by the Goths to their victorious generals. This word in their language signifies “more than mortal,” _i.e._, demi-gods.

=Aussig.= A village in Prussia, where, in 1426, the army of the margrave Frederick von Meissen was defeated by the Hussites and Poles under Jakubko von Wrezezowecez and Prince Sigismund Koribut. The city was plundered and burned the same night by the Hussites.

=Austerlitz= (Moravia). Here a battle was fought between the French and the allied Austrian and Russian armies, December 2, 1805. Three emperors commanded: Alexander of Russia, Francis of Austria, and Napoleon of France. The killed and wounded exceeded 30,000 on the side of the allies, who lost 40 standards, 150 pieces of cannon, and thousands of prisoners; the French loss amounted to about 12,000 men. The decisive victory of the French led to the treaty of Presburg, signed December 26, 1805.