CHAP. XXXII.] ORGANIBATION OF CAVALRY. 



flit 



weapon with the cava.ry man in motion, and is indispen- 

 sable in his equipment." 



This evidence of an officer of great experience ia 

 certainly entitled to weight, and it is particularly to be 

 remarked that while he depreciates the sabre, and highly 

 values the pistol, that he is also equally convinced that 

 it should be only used as an adjunct to the momentum. 

 In fa^t, he would use cavalr}-- as did Alexander and 

 Hannibal, merely exchanging the old arm for an improved 

 and more deadly weapon. 



Colonel Gilmor, one of the hardest fighters in the 

 Southern service, gives the same testimony in his ** Four 

 Years in the Saddle." Speaking of one fight in which he 

 used his sabre, and successfully, he makes the remark, 

 " Had I drawn my pistols mstead of sabre several 

 would have fallen, ioT we were at close quarters." 



In another place he gives a most striking example 

 of the value of the revolver, "We had nearly all got 

 through a fence when I saw Kemp engaged with a 

 powerful fellow, who was closing in upon him with 

 sword upraised. Kemp always carried two pistols : in 

 one he had but one load, that he fired at hii adversary, 

 but missed, then threw the pistol at him and struck him 

 in the breast. The trooper closed in upon him before 

 he could draw his second pistol, and seizing him by the 

 hair, tried to drag him off the horse, at the same time 

 lashing him across the shoulders with his sabre. Kemp 

 held down his head and took it all, the while trying to 

 draw his pistol. I had cut my way to him, and had 

 raised myself with uplifted sabre to cleave the fellow's 

 skull, when Kemp discharged his pistol into his stomach 

 and he was free." ' 



Speaking of another figiit where his men were all 

 mixed up with the enemy, cutting and slashing at each 

 other right and left, he says, *' Very few pistols were 

 u^ed, or our loss would have been twice as heavy." 



Major Scott's " Partisan Life with Mosby " also teems 

 with evidence of the same nature. He refers to one 

 fight of 100 of Mosby's men with about the same force 



» Gilmor, 235. 



