Female Warriors, Vol. 2 (of 2): Memorials of Female Valour and Heroism, from the Mythological Ages to the Present Era. — John Shaqi
Female Warriors, Vol. 2 (of 2): Memorials of Female Valour and Heroism, from the Mythological Ages to the Present Era.Clayton, Ellen C. (Ellen Creathorne)
History
Female Warriors, Vol. 2 (of 2): Memorials of Female Valour and Heroism, from the Mythological Ages to the Present Era.
Clayton, Ellen C. (Ellen Creathorne)
Amazons; Women -- Biography; Women soldiers
While the hatred of Austria was felt by all throughout Hungary,
Croatia and Sclavonia were actuated, on the contrary, by feelings of
the deepest loyalty to the house of Hapsburg. Baron W., who published
his adventures under the title of "Scenes of the Civil War in Hungary
in 1848-9, with the personal adventures of an Austrian officer,
etc.," declares that the Croatians joined the Imperial standard by
thousands; even the women, moved by an ardent and loyal courage,
aided in defending the frontiers against the Bosnians, who, excited
by the emissaries of Kossuth, took every opportunity for raids and
invasions over the border. While the men were flocking to the banners
of Jellachich, the ban of Croatia, their wives and daughters took up
arms and repaired to the chain of posts on the Turkish boundary, "that
all the men might be able to take the field; and such an eight days'
duty as these frontier posts," he adds, "is no trifle, and requires
not a little firmness." Old, half-invalided frontier subalterns,
incapacitated for taking the field, were the commandants; young,
many of them handsome, females composed their troops. "By my faith!"
exclaims the Baron, "I should have no objection to be the commander of
such a corps of Ottochan females myself!"
Numbers of Croatian and Sclavonian women accompanied the Austrian army
into Germany and Italy. "We had," says the same author, "wives and
daughters of frontier soldiers with us in Peschiera and on the march
through Hungary, who equalled the men in the endurance of fatigue,
and displayed undaunted courage in battle. In Hungary we had with us
a young Croatian, the daughter of an old Seressan, who was as daring
a rider as the best hussar, and more than once fearlessly joined the
men in the charge. A Hungarian _jurat_ gave her in an action a cut
on the left cheek, which she returned with a severe blow on the arm,
seized the bridle of his horse, and took him prisoner. This horse, a
grey stallion, she ever afterwards rode, and refused to sell, though I
offered her forty ducats for him."
The Countess Helene St. ----, a Hungarian patriot, was the sister of an
old comrade of Baron W. The brother, who owned a magnificent estate,
was a Magyar to the very core; and directly the insurrection broke out,
he took up arms, and fell bravely fighting for his country in February,
1849. His dying agonies were soothed by an unexpected meeting with his
early friend; the Baron.
Helene joined the insurgents soon after her brother left home,
and served as aide-de-camp to his maternal uncle, who commanded a
considerable Magyar corps. One cold, moonlight night, a few days after
the death of the count, the author of the "Adventures" discovered the
corpse of this beautiful girl, dressed in the military uniform of a
Hungarian soldier, stretched out at the foot of a tree, her life's
blood crimsoning the white snow.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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