Realizing they could not starve out the garrison, the French and Spanish launched a massive offensive in September 1782, only to be thwarted by the British artillery’s use of “red-hot shot”-heated cannonballs that set fire to whole ships and batteries. In between these vital resupply operations, the defenders of Gibraltar kept the besiegers at bay with sharpshooters, cannon fire and surprise nighttime attacks. The two nations hoped they could force Gibraltar’s small garrison of 5,000 troops into a war of attrition, but their siege lines ultimately proved no match for the British Navy, which ran the blockade twice-first in 1780 and then again in 1781. In June 1779 a fleet of French and Spanish ships blockaded Gibraltar from the sea, while a large infantry force constructed redoubts and other fortifications on land. By the time the battle had ended, the 700-year old city of Carthage lay in ruins and its remaining 50,000 inhabitants had been sold into slavery. When they finally breached the walls in 146 B.C., Scipio’s forces had to fight their way through the city streets for six days and nights before defeating the Carthaginian resistance.
Faced with this level of resistance, the Romans were held at bay for three long years. According to the ancient historian Appian, the women of Carthage even cut off their hair so it could be used as rope for makeshift catapults. The Carthaginians had prepared for the invasion by turning most of their city into an armory and enlisting slaves and civilians into the military. Met by 60-foot walls, the Romans cordoned off the city, set up camp and laid siege. In 149 B.C., a Roman army led by Scipio Aemilianus arrived in North Africa intent on destroying Carthage once and for all.
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This grisly standoff came as part of the Third Punic War, the last in a series of notoriously violent clashes between the ancient Romans and the Phoenician city of Carthage.
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With the fall of Vicksburg, Union forces took full control of the Mississippi River, effectively splitting the Confederacy in half for the rest of the war. Without reinforcements and with only meager supplies, Pemberton finally capitulated on July 4. While the outnumbered Southerners managed to hold their lines and seal the breach, their victory proved short-lived. After probing the Confederate lines in a pair of unsuccessful assaults, Grant reluctantly ordered his men to dig trenches and lay siege to the city.ĭesperate to avoid the carnage, many of the city’s civilians were forced to take refuge in a network of clay caves that became known as the “Prairie Dog Village.” In an effort to break the standoff, Grant’s forces eventually dug a tunnel and detonated mines under the city’s fortifications. Pemberton within the town of Vicksburg, Mississippi. Grant trapped Confederate forces under John C. The deadlock began in May 1863, when Union General Ulysses S. Along with the Battle of Gettysburg, the Siege of Vicksburg stands as one of the major turning points in the Civil War.