The Confederate officers, John H. Morgan,
John S. Mosby, and especially N. B. Forrest, were famous for the
extent and daring of their raids. Of all the leaders of important
raids in the War of Secession none surpassed the great Confederate
cavalry General, J. E. B. Stuart, whose riding right round the
imposing Federal army is well known. Yet not one of the raids
above mentioned had any effect on the main course of the war
in which they occurred or on the result of the great conflict.
In the last war the case was the same. In January 1905, General
Mischenko with 10,000 sabres and three batteries of artillery
marched right round the flank of Marshal Oyama's great Japanese
army, and occupied Niu-chwang--not the treaty port so-called, but
a place not very far from it. For several days he was unmolested,
and in about a week he got back to his friends with a loss which
was moderate in proportion to his numbers. In the following May
Mischenko made another raid, this time round General Nogi's flank.
He had with him fifty squadrons, a horse artillery battery, and a
battery of machine guns. Starting on the 17th, he was discovered
on the 18th, came in contact with his enemy on the 19th, but
met with no considerable hostile force till the 20th, when the
Japanese cavalry arrived just in time to collide with the Russian
rearguard of two squadrons. On this General Mischenko 'retired
at his ease for some thirty miles along the Japanese flank and
perhaps fifteen miles away from it.
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