Interesting description of one of the last cavalry charges, taken from The great war forum about the same topic:
Below is a Narrative of Events 14 July 1916 of the Secunderabad Cavalry Brigade (War Diary of 2nd Indian Cavalry Division WO95/1180).
It was written by Brig-General C L Gregory on 16 July 1916.
If you dont want to read the whole report the charge is at 9pm on the second page
Another, more thrilling to read, account taken from the book 'The Royal Deccan Horse' who in July 1916 were the 20th Deccan Horse and belonged to the Secunderabad Cavalry Brigade of the 2nd Indian Cavalry Division.
As it passed through the defile cheers were raised by the gunners and infantry, as this was the first chance that the cavalry had had of acting mounted since the commencement of trench warfare.
As each squadron cleared the defile it formed line and advanced at a gallop in the direction taken by the advanced guard, which lay through a broad belt of standing corn, in which small parties of the enemy lay concealed. Individual Germans now commenced popping up on all sides, throwing up their arms and shouting " Kamerad," and not a few, evidently under the impression that no quarter would be given, flung their arms around the horses' necks and begged for mercy — all of which impeded the advance.
It was about this time that one of our aeroplanes came over, flying very low and firing tracer bullets to show the positions of hostile machine-guns and also that of a German trench which ran from High Wood to Delville Wood and which, owing to the corn, was invisible.
When the advanced guard reached its objective, a German trench to the north of Delville Wood, occupied by infantry, could be seen clearly and German artillery (located by the flash of the guns) opened fire from a point near Square 6.
During the whole period of the advance the regiment had been exposed to flanking machine-gun fire from Delville Wood; consequently "C" Squadron was ordered to form a defensive flank upon the right of "A" Squadron, and "D" Squadron was moved up to occupy the gap between the regiment and the 7th Dragoon Guards, who appeared to be held up some distance south of High Wood. "B" Squadron was retained in a central position as a support in case of unforeseen eventualities.
The Brigadier had specified that communication was to be maintained with the 7th Dragoon Guards on the left and the 9th Division on the right. As no touch could be obtained with the 9th Division, whose whereabouts were unknown, and as any further advance of the regiment to a position from which to attack Delville Wood from the north would separate it still further from the 7th Dragoon Guards, messages were sent back to the Brigadier asking for instructions, but unfortunately he could not be found.
Captain Jarvis now reported that bodies of Germans were massing on his right front, as though preparing for a counterattack, and consequently " B" Squadron was warned to be ready to act at any moment. The German attack, however, did not materialize. It had now become dark and as the left flank of the regiment was in the air, whilst the right flank, "C" Squadron, was under heavy fire from Delville Wood, and not being able to get in touch with the Brigadier, Lieutenant-Colonel Tennant ordered the regiment to fall back and take up a position extending from the right flank of the 7th Dragoon Guards along the valley towards Square 17, where it was hoped contact would be made with the infantry.
This retirement was carried out in the nick of time, for shortly afterwards the enemy opened heavy artillery fire upon what had been the regiment's advanced position, and as no cover of any sort was available for either men or horses the casualties would have been extremely heavy. About midnight the enemy once more opened heavy artillery fire over the valley, but failed to locate the position, and the night passed without further incident except that a German patrol, advancing from Delville Wood, ran into one of the regimental listening patrols and was fired on, two prisoners being taken, both belonging to the 16th Bavarian Regiment. At 3.30 a.m. the Brigade was ordered to retire. Fortunately, the morning was misty, which enabled the troops to ride back, undetected by the enemy, through the artillery positions (which were saturated with tear gas) to the valley of Montauban, where horses were watered and fed, and the Brigade returned to bivouac at Meaulte.
Later in the morning the Divisional Commander, Major-General Macandrew, visited the regiment and congratulated it on its performance, especially commending Captain Jarvis for his leading of the advanced guard.
The casualties were as follows: — Rissaldar Konsal Singh and Ressaidar Ali Sher Khan, wounded; 9 other ranks killed and 39 wounded (total 50); 19 horses killed and 53 wounded (total 72).
Here is a personal impression of An RGA Heavy Battery Signaller, Ounsworth. He witnessed the incident of the charge, extracts as follows:
'I saw this 'plane, a Morane-Saulnier - a French plane we had at the time, monoplane, kept diving down on to the corner of the field on our left front. I saw this cavalry coming across - I found out afterwards they were the Indians, Deccan Horse they called them ... and this plane was diving down like that and up again and suddenly the officer in charge of cavalry cottoned on and he stood up in his stirrups waved his sword above his head and just charged like that across the field. The two outer lots split like that you see so they made a pincer. The next thing we saw was thirty-four Jerry prisoners some of those heavy machine guns. They were waiting while the cavalry got a bit nearer - my God they'd have slaughtered them.
Ounsworth goes on to say ' Then I saw some [more] Jerry prisoners coming back, about two hundred ... a score of our chaps, guards .............. a big German officer leading in front a proper square head he was ...about six foot two or three ......he's walking behind this corporal who was leading and he suddenly grabs his rifle from behind ........tunred around, don't know what he yelled he was too far away, shouting to his men. Instantly our chaps they just run about fifty yards away and turned round and started shooting at 'em. My God they pretty soon quelled that mutiny....' It is not clear just how long after the cavalry charge the second incident of prisoners took place.
tldr cav is OP
