Avenging Varus - Battle of the Long Bridges (15 AD) DOCUMENTARY

Ever since they had taken the offensive, the legions had dealt a punishing string of blows to the Germanic tribes. Entire villages and towns had been wiped out, with pillaging, burning, and mass slaughter creating a wasteland beyond the Rhine. The campaigns at the end of 15AD in particular had seen a massive assault by the legions which had pushed Arminius deep into the forests of the east. However, with winter approaching, the Romans had finally been forced to relent and were now receding like a tide back to their bases on the frontier. This critical moment opened a window of opportunity for Arminius. At the Long Bridges, he had managed to trap four legions upon their retreat against the marshes and once again made ready to repeat his master stroke of Teutoburg Forest. The tribes had suffered long enough at the hands of the invader. Here, they would make the Romans pay. Here, they would renew the hope of victory. 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Enjoy a starter pack when you register and use the code BOOM to get additional rewards that include 200 doubloons, two premium ships, the St. Louis and the Emden, 20x restless fire camouflage, 2.5 million credits, and seven days of premium account credit. Enjoy, and happy sailing. Kaikina had made the decision to commit to the crossing at the long bridges rather than try to force his way around. This meant dividing his forces in two, one for repairs and one for defense. They began immediately. Screening forces fanned out to secure the perimeter while lignatories collected building materials, cohorts dug trenches, and engineering squads planned construction works. The Germanic tribes meanwhile occupied the high ground above and were similarly active. They set up their own positions in the hills, sent out raiding parties to harass the enemy, and began their own counter-engineering works to divert nearby streams towards the Romans to further flood their positions. That first day was an incredible site of frenzied activity. Like a pair of disturbed anthills, the opposing army swarmed over the area to complete their missions while thwarting that of the enemy. In these contests, the Romans had the advantage of experience and technical expertise. However, the tribes had the advantage of the terrain, their knowledge of the area, and their vast numbers. The legionary work crews were forced to trudge through wet and muddy conditions under a near constant barrage of sling stones and light javelins. What few Roman fortifications managed to go up became magnets for such attacks which whittled away the defenders with incessant harassment. The legionaries which attempted to strike back were said to be heavily encumbered by the mud, barely able to advance or throw their pila. Thankfully, the fearless generalship of Caicina managed to see them through to nightfall. They were alive, but had little to show for it. Much of their progress had been undone by the attacks or the unexpected flooding that had been unleashed by the barbarians. Food supplies were dropping, the wounded or dying were piling up, and morale was on the verge of collapse. Meanwhile, on the dry ground above, they could see the warm fires of the barbarian tribes and hear the raucous laughter of an enemy in high spirits. Tomorrow's prospects were grim. Caicina knew that inaction and complacency would breed despair in this situation. They needed some ray of hope to cling to, to fight for. He therefore called a meeting of the senior leadership and consulted with the engineers on what could be done. They decided that it would be possible to begin marching across the partially completed bridgeworks. While this would not get them back home, it would at least represent some forward progress and should greatly reduce the enemy's ability to strike at them. The orders were passed down through the chain of command, yet even he was not assured of its success. Tacitus writes that that night, Caicina was haunted by a nightmare where he had seen General Varus rising out of the swamps, covered in blood, extending his hand and beckoning to him. Such an ill omen was not to be shared with the men, lest they lose all hope. He must trust in the plan. At dawn, the legions marched out. They assembled into a massive square formation, with the baggage train at its center and a legion on each side. The advance across the long bridges was painfully slow. The heavier baggage carts and cavalry forces carefully moved across the groaning causeway, while the lighter infantry and auxiliaries waded through the marshes on the flanks. Arminius and the tribes watched like some famished bird of prey. Patient, they merely sent forth harassing units to delay the rear guard, while keeping the bulk of their troops at the ready. The Romans were maintaining a tight perimeter, and their discipline was holding out, but this would not last forever. As the legions moved forward into the marshes, their supply train, aptly called the impedimenta, became bogged down. Seeing this, the square was forced to slow and come to a halt. As the sun rose higher in the sky, and the hours of the day ticked by, it seems that the soldiers had enough of merely watching their military slaves struggling to keep the mules and wagons moving. They therefore began to abandon their positions as guards, to help things move along. The tidy order of the defensive square broke apart. It was this exact moment of weakness that Arminius had been waiting for. He now ordered the assault. Mass waves of tribal forces ran screaming down the hills, and crashed upon the disoriented Roman rear. The attack proved devastating. Arminius himself led a pick force of men that cut through the legions and their animals, heading for the soft innards of the baggage train, which held the supplies, the wounded, the officer corps, and the eagles. As he advanced, the chieftain is reported to have called out that this was Varus and his legions, trapped once again in their ancient doom. Indeed, the situation was quickly spiraling into a disaster. The Roman force was holding together by a mere thread. Most of its units abandoned the long bridges, fighting their way back towards the more defensible dry land from which they had come. The integrity of the defensive square was thus entirely gone, leaving Caecina dangerously exposed. Germanic forces closed in, cutting the horse out from under the Roman commander and almost killing him. Luckily, the units from the vanguard came to his rescue and helped escort the remaining forces back to Terrafirma. They did so at great cost, as the wounded or isolated elements of their forces had to be abandoned. In their wake, the Germanic troops swarmed in to engulf what was left behind. They took prisoners, killed stragglers, and raided the abandoned tools, tents, supplies, and valuables that clogged the sunken battlefield. Perhaps the only silver lining to be had was that this led the barbarians to lose their own cohesion, which allowed the Romans the time they needed to regroup. The surviving legions had escaped the defeat with the eagles and not much else. They had no food, no shelter, and few tools for making camp. Thus, as the sun began to set, they were left to build a most pitiful camp. Its walls were made of makeshift sod, topped by an assortment of scavenged materials, while its insides were a waterlogged field of cold, drenched, bloodied soldiers who mostly slept out in the elements. They huddled together for warmth and ate what few rations they had in their own personal belongings. Within 24 hours, the legions had found themselves back where they started the day before, but now in a far more dire situation. Things truly seemed hopeless. It's certain that many soldiers spent the night haunted by nightmarish visions of the aftermath of Teutoburg that they had discovered just a few months earlier. Surely it would be their skulls next that would be pinned to the trees. The men were so on edge that when at one point one of the surviving horses broke its tether and ran screaming through the camp, the legions panicked and attempted to swarm out of the gate, thinking that the enemy was closing in upon them. The entire army was on the verge of dissolving into a rout. The catastrophe was only averted by the quick thinking of Kaikina. The general, aware of the latest reports and knowing that this was a false alarm, threw himself before the exit, vowing that the only way out would be over his dead body. The sight of their commander seems to have shaken the men out of their animalistic flight response. He took the opportunity to address the assembled mob in stride by proclaiming that beyond those gates lay death alone. Their only hope for survival was as a disciplined whole. As individuals, they would be picked off one by one. With these careful words and perhaps an appeal to their remaining sense of honor, the men were back down from the ledge of mutiny. The army would hold together one more night. Kaikina knew that he would not have many more. A plan was thus devised that would make or break the legions. At dawn the next morning, the ramparts of the camp were all but empty. Some nervous sentries were posted, but it was obvious to the German scouts that the legions must be exhausted and on the breaking point, refusing to even commit to their usual full guard. They summoned a war council in the face of this new information. Arminius was cautious. He knew best that a cornered beast was at its most dangerous. Better to let it bleed out in the corner or set a trap along the escape routes than gamble on some unnecessary killing blow. However, his council was overruled by the other chiefs. This fight was personal to them. Many had lost friends and family over the last few years and were eager to see them avenged. They were done waiting. The fighting the day before had proven the Romans mortal. Their army bled. It was battered and broken, lying in a camp fortified with mere mounds of sod and a handful of guards. Now was the time to fulfill oaths. Now was the time to end this man The Germanic tribes promptly massed their ranks and unleashed an all-out assault, each tribal chief leading their contingents into the fray. The vanguard moved quickly, with bundles of branches to fill in trenches and with tools to tear down anything that might slow the assault. Soon, they were at the ramparts, clearing it with volleys of javelins and scaling it with their hands or prepared ladders. Led by Arminius, they flooded into the camp. However, it became difficult to maintain cohesion of the force as it spread out in all directions to slaughter and loot mindlessly. This was exactly what Caecina had counted on. At this pivotal moment, he sounded the trumpets. Ranks of troops now emerged from their hidden positions, leading a counter-assault against the overflowing ramparts. They reclaimed the walls, with centurions carefully directing the men to repel fresh waves of tribesmen and to cut off those inside. At the same time, all surviving Roman horsemen rode out from the rear of the camp to strike at the Germanic horde from the flank beyond the wall. Additional gates were flung open, unleashing yet more formed cohorts which poured out to engage the main body of the enemy, forcing them into a set-piece battle. The Germanic tribes were caught completely off-guard. They had expected cowering, half-armed men in a panic, not disciplined, organized legionaries. This misjudgment would prove their undoing. The legions now held the advantage of surprise and the ability to finally fight the type of battle they wanted. It was said that the Romans yelled out to the enemy, none of your trees here, none of your swamps, just a fair field and fair gods. Channeling pent-up frustration and a fear of what might happen should they fail, the legions delivered a brutal, merciless counter-punch. The fighting would continue until the sun had set. Many Germanic chieftains were injured or killed, and Arminius only barely managed to escape. Under cover of night, they pulled back. Somehow, the Romans had snatched victory from the jaws of defeat. Yet Caecina knew that his great victory had only won him a bit of breathing room with which to escape. Should he linger, the tribes might be able to regroup and smash the legions which had expended the last of their energy in this desperate bid for survival. He therefore ordered them to march out immediately for the Rhine. After several long days, they finally arrived as a ragged, bloodied, exhausted column that could barely be recognized as a Roman army. During their absence, a panic had set in on the frontier, with many fearing another Teutoburg had occurred. Some even argued that the bridge over the Rhine should be destroyed to prevent a Germanic invasion. Luckily, Agrippina, wife of Germanicus, had forbidden such an action. She believed in the strength of Rome and dutifully awaited their return. As Caecina's troops finally stumbled into view, the Domina was there to greet them with coins, clothing, medicine, and food. They had survived. Germanicus, meanwhile, had been making his own return home along the northern coast. As his fleet approached a tricky patch of sea, two legions were disembarked and marched alongside the ships to facilitate the crossing. For a while, these advanced along a peaceful shore. However, strong winds soon bore down on them, and a severe tide drove the swells against them. I'll now quote an evocative passage from Tacitus. His army was driven and tossed hither and thither. The country too was flooded. Sea, shore, fields presented one aspect. Nor could the treacherous quicksands be distinguished from solid ground, or shallows from deep water. Men were swept away by the waves, or sucked under by eddies. Beasts of burden, baggage, lifeless bodies floated about and blocked their way. The companies were mingled in confusion, now with the breast, now with the head only above water, sometimes losing their footing, parted from their comrades, or drowned. The voice of mutual encouragement availed not against the adverse forces of the waves. There was nothing to distinguish the brave from the coward, the prudent from the careless, forethought from chance. The same strong power swept everything before it. At last, Vitellius struggled out to higher ground and led his men up to it. There, they passed the night without necessary food, without fire, many of them with bare or bruised limbs, in a plate as pitiable as that of men besieged by an For such, at least, have the opportunity of a glorious death, while here was destruction without honor. Daylight finally restored land to their sight, and they pushed their way to the river Vesurgus, where Caesar had arrived with the fleet. The legions then embarked, while a rumor was flying about that they were all drowned. Nor was there a belief in their safety, till they saw Caesar and the army returned finally. In this way, the legions of Germanicus crawled their way back to their own lines. It was a dour note on which to end an otherwise glorious campaigning season. His men were battered in both body and spirit. In their current state, it would be impossible to carry on the fight. Luckily, this last, dark chapter of the war had not yet reached the rest of the empire. As far as they knew, it had been nothing but inspiring tales of conquest. The provinces of Gaul, Spain, and Italy all now competed to offer men horses, arms, and gold for the war effort. With these, the tattered remnants of the legions were renewed. Morale swelled as the general and his lieutenants made the rounds of the winter camps, visiting the wounded, rewarding the deserving, and showering all with praise. Veterans and raw recruits alike were assured that the ultimate victory was within their grasp. All it would take was one more campaign like the last. They made ready for war. A huge thanks to the patrons for funding the channel, and to the researchers, writers, and artists for making this episode possible. Stay tuned for more exciting chapters in our series on Avenging Varus, and check out these other related videos, including the one on Roman fast food. See you in the next one!