Chapter 439: Rescuing Heraclea
Before, Galaguso was only afraid of Theonia’s strength, but there is now a mix of respect and admiration. In their hearts, there is nothing frightening about Syracuse, and Theonia, who can defeat the powerful Samnites, is bound to win the final victory.
Thus even without the request of the Theonians, Galaguso took the initiative to attack Metapontum.
The people of Metapontum had noticed that after joining the Theonian Alliance, the northern became peaceful. However, after they returned to Taranto, the northern region was once again ravaged by the people of Galaguso. They then began regretting their choice, and their complaints about the council formed by Isalokas and the Tarantines started to increase. Of course, this is something for the future.
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At this time, the Heracleans urgently sent people to seek help from Thurii while they strengthened the city’s defence.
After receiving Heraclea’s request for help, the Theonian Senate: Although they were shocked, they still made a quick decision and ordered the only legion left in the city of Thurii, which is the seventh legion, to rush to Heraclea for rescue.
But now, with even the seventh legion being taken away, the strength of Thurii has been stretched to the extreme. Except for the naval fleet and the freemen in the port, Thurii no longer has decent defensive strength on the Sybaris plain.
Seeing the empty defence and the lack of young adults and middle-aged in Thurii, it is not advisable to deploy the manpower left to form new troops as it would completely paralyse the entire daily affairs of Thurii. Thus the Senate decided to form the eighth legion in the Bruttian region immediately and rushed to Thurii to defend the centre of the union.
They soon passed the resolution.
Petaru, Kaduk and Bodiam, who usually didn’t speak much in the Senate, took the initiative to go to the Bruttian region to conscript and form the troops.
Kunogelata, the rotating chairperson, declined politely on the grounds that “Hieronymus was the best candidate as he was the one responsible for military training in various regions and knew well about the reserve soldiers in Bruttii.”
And in order to not make these Bruttian statesmen dissatisfied, he specifically explained, “Several lords, I think you should also know that compared with the armies of other city-states, Theonia’s way of mobilising citizens and forming legions is very different. Thus, only the Ministry of Military people can understand and implement it. Furthermore, there is also an explicit provision in the Theonian Law that only the Ministry of Military could form legions…”
In the end, the several Bruttian statesmen could only sit down bitterly and murmured with discontent.
With Hieronymus becoming the only candidate to go to the Bruttian region and form a new legion, he temporarily transferred his work as the quartermaster to Mersis.
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Even though the rivers and marshes in Heraclea delayed the marching speed of the troops led by Diaomilas, he still managed to reach the northern bank of the Basento River and merge with Umakas’ troops bringing the total strength of Taranto to more than 15,000 men.
After discussing a bit, Taranto once again divided their troops.
Diaomilas led 8,000 men to rush upstream along the Basento River in an attempt to cross the river from the shallow reach.
Teriphias, standing at the top of the city wall, immediately understood the enemy’s plan once he saw their troops.
Even though their troops were far less than the other side, Teriphias still made a decisive decision and sent more than 3,000 mixed troops of light and heavy infantry to follow the Tarantines on the other stop and stop them from crossing the river.
This forced Diaomilas to proceed cautiously upstream where the water was shallower and the river narrower while also choosing to wade longer sections of the river to avoid getting intercepted by the Heracleans.
The Heraclean region is, after all, a small plain formed by several rivers with its flat terrain. However, since it is now the dry season, Diaomilas quickly found a suitable location.
Diaomilas began making his troops line up along the river in a formation about a half-kilometre long. At the sound of the salpinx, they wade across the river together.
Faced with such an attacking formation, the Heracleans did not dare to fight them head-on as their aim was only to delay the Tarantines. Thus they only threw their javelins and fired arrows at the Tarantines, which, together with the silt at the bottom of the river trapping the Tarantines feet, causing some confusion and casualties.
But by the time the Tarantines got to the other side, the Heracleans had long fled away.
Diaomilas then reorganised his troops and prepared to march eastward. He needed to rush to Heraclea as soon as possible and burn down the bridge on the Agri River not far from the south of the city, cutting off the quickest way for the Theonians to reinforce Heraclea. Afterwards, they would build a pontoon bridge on both sides of the Basento River to meet with Umakas’ troops crossing the river and besiege Heraclea.
But just then, several Tarantine cavalries rushed across the Basento River and told Diaomilas that Theonia’s reinforcements had arrived at the pontoon bridge on the south side of the Agri River.
Diaomilas was surprised, ‘How could Theonia’s reinforcements come so fast?!’
Of course, he did not know that the main road connecting Heraclea and Thurii made it only take Heraclea’s messenger to reach the city of Thurii in just more than an hour. And it only took the Theonian Senate an hour to make a quick decision, assemble the seventh legion at the naval base and then set out.
It had even included the delay due to Seclian’s obstruction, where he even went to the Senate to protest as he was already angry enough when they sent the new legion to Krimisa. Unexpectedly, just one day later, even the only legion left participating in the training was also transferred, wasting Seclian’s more than ten days of effort in training them. Furthermore, he also wanted to lead the fleet to defeat the Syracusan navy with the new tactics, giving the people of Theonia a great surprise and proving himself. But now, even the infantries on the warship are gone, turning his great idea into nothing.
Even though Seclian’s anger could be imagined, the decision of the Senate can not be changed by a young strategos who is not even a statesman.
But what Kunogelata and the others thought was that whether the navy would go to war or not wasn’t the main issue, as they were unlikely to be a match for the mighty Syracusan fleet anyway. At most, their maritime route would just be blocked. But once Taranto captured Heraclea, it would allow their armies to set foot in Amendolara’s territory, which would be a disaster for Theonia, which was now fully engaged in the war to the south!
Thus Kunogelata first criticised his shortsightedness and disregard for the overall situation. He then comforted him, “Lord Davos will soon lead back the army, so your naval fleet won’t lack the infantry’s support…”
Hence Seclian could only return with resentment. He was still not completely come out of the joy of being promoted to his position as a navarch a few months ago, but after this time, he realised that his words had no weight in the Senate…
After the assembly of the seventh legion, the legatus immediately ordered the troops to march forward.
The legatus of the army was none other than Matonis, the patrol captain of Thurii.
Before Davos led his army to Potentia, Philesius once asked him who the legatus of the newly formed legion would be.
After much consideration, Davos decided to let Matonis and Olivos serve as the legatus. First of all, they have served as senior centurions for many years. They not only have rich experience on the battlefield but also in commanding large forces. Second, both of them have important positions: One is the patrol captain of Thurii, and the other is the adjutant of the quartermaster of the Ministry of Military. And due to the newly built legion was just to defend Thurii, they could still do their jobs. And even though they might cancel the two newly-built legions after the war, it would be much easier to promote them as formal legatus of the army afterwards.
It can be said that Davos thoughtfully considered them both, but neither of them is willing to accept it, especially Matonis, who doesn’t want to have it easy in the rear while his comrades fight hard in the front line.
However, even though Davos treated his comrades closely, this time, he didn’t even try to persuade them and just forced them to accept the mandatory order. Fortunately, they could now fight. Olivos led the sixth legion to Krimisa while Matonis led the seventh legion to rescue Heraclea.
Matonis, who held his grievances for long as he didn’t have any place to vent. Therefore, as soon as he received the order, he not only urged the troops to speed up but also ran at the front of the group without riding his horse. With his example, the seventh legion naturally marched much faster, only taking them nearly three hours to reach the pontoon bridge on the Agri River.
But this new legion was not complete as they still lacked cavalries, reconnaissance and engineering brigades. Furthermore, since most of the soldiers are preparatory citizens and registered freemen, they don’t have the money to buy a complete set of new legionary equipment. For this reason, some heavy infantry brigades looked like light-armoured brigades with their incomplete weapons and equipment. And since they set out in a hurry, they didn’t even bring physicians and logistics.
The Tarantine ships in the river repeatedly tried to destroy the pontoon bridge on the Agri River but kept failing because of the Heraclean soldiers and the escort of ships’ defence. On the contrary, they manage to burn two Tarantine ships with their flaming arrows, forcing the two ships to moor at the estuary of the Agri River. But this just allowed them to witness the arrival of Theonian reinforcements. Hence, they immediately sent someone to the north bank of the Basento River to report to Umakas, which led to the cavalry rushing to Diaomilas to report.
Because the Tarantine did not act decisively and marched quickly enough, coupled with the poor land conditions between Metapontum and Heraclea(compared with the road of Theonia), in addition to the efforts of the Heracleans, this had allowed the Theonians to take the lead in this marching competition.
Diaomilas had witnessed the fierce fighting ability of the Theonian army, so he became more cautious and could not advance rashly now that the Theonians had come. Thus he ordered his army to stop at the south bank of the Basento River, informed Umakas to build a pontoon bridge on the north bank, and then led the army across the river to join forces again. He would then wait, and only after he understood the situation of Heraclea would he take further action.
Although Matonis likes to fight, he is not reckless. So when the seventh legion arrived at Heraclea, he had made the soldiers go to the city first to rest as they were already exhausted.
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On the other hand, Olivos led the sixth legion to Krimisa.
The current Praetor of Krimisa is Protesilaus, who took his post for only less than a year. Scambras, who was at the end of his term, was the one to recommend him and was supported by Davos. At this moment, he led the officials of Krimisa to meet Olivos outside the city.