Marching With Caesar - Civil War

by R. W. Peake

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  The affairs of men are such a mess sometimes. I remember Caesar saying that great events result from trivial causes, and that was certainly the case with what had taken place between Torquatus and Balbus. As Balbus told his story, I was also struck by an uncomfortable feeling of my own, like I was hearing a tale that I had heard before. In fact, it was a story that I had lived and after hearing it, it left me sitting up that night, thinking. Torquatus and Balbus were lifelong friends, cousins in fact, their mothers being sisters, and had joined the Legions together. They had been inseparable companions, marching first in Pompey’s Legions before volunteering to come over to the 10th in exchange for both being promoted to Sergeants. Of course this meant that they could not be in the same tent like they had been, yet they remained close. They ascended the ranks at roughly the same time, and it was at the end of the campaign in Gaul, when the 10th spent time in garrison and Caesar used the other Legions quelling the various rebellions that the trouble began. Freed of the constant worry of marching, fighting, and all that goes with it, both men decided that it was time to turn to matters of the heart, seeing that it looked very much like we were going to be staying in place for a while, which was true. As nearly as I could figure out, about the same time I took up with Gisela, Balbus and Torquatus fell in love, which is a wonderful thing, except when it is with the same woman. Nonetheless, in all forms of combat, there can only be one victor and in this case, it was Torquatus, or so Torquatus thought. The maid in question became Torquatus’ woman, and for several months, things seemed to be all right. Balbus had smarted from the defeat but said that he had gotten over it. Then, Torquatus’ father had died, so he had taken leave to go home, whereupon he asked Balbus to watch over his woman, something that Balbus did to such a degree that you can imagine what happened.

  As Balbus talked of this, he had the grace to look somewhat guilty, giving a rueful grin. “In all honesty, I had gotten over her at that point, but when she offered herself, what was I supposed to do?” he said.

  When put that way, it was a hard point to argue. If it had been just a short-term affair, while Torquatus was gone, that would have been one thing, and it would have been one of those secrets between men and women that many take to the grave with them. However, if there is anything as mysterious and complicated as a woman’s heart, I hope never to run into it. According to Balbus, the result of the affair was twofold; the woman decided she had made a mistake in choosing Torquatus, then had gotten herself pregnant. Now, she could not live without Balbus, yet the fact that Balbus no longer had those kinds of feelings for her and told her as much did not seem to deter her from declaring to Torquatus her undying love for Balbus. In this, I had to sympathize with Torquatus, imagining what it would have been like to come back to the Legion, expecting your best friend and woman to be waiting for you, never suspecting either of them of treachery. Perhaps from the woman, for they are fickle creatures, but never that kind of betrayal from a man as close to you as your brother. There I go being naïve again, I suppose. As one can imagine, her revelation put an unbearable strain on the friendship between the two men, a rift that was still unrepaired to that day in my tent as Balbus told me about it.

  “I tried everything I could to make amends to Torquatus, but he's never forgiven me,” Balbus said morosely.

  “What happened to the woman?”

  “She died trying to bear my child.” Balbus took a deep drink from his wine cup.

  Setting it down, he looked at me, and I could see the sadness and pain in his eyes, making me wonder what the main cause of it was, the betrayal of his friend, or the death of a woman who was bearing his child. Both, I suppose.

  “So, Primus Pilus, that's the cause of the rift between Torquatus and me, and why he hates me so much. I really can’t blame him. I have hopes that being sent to another Legion may make things easier for both of us.”

  “Don’t be so sure.” I had not planned on saying anything, but as usual, the numen inside me took over. “Although it’s from a different cause, your story sounds similar to my own, and the time I was away with the 6th did nothing to make things any easier.”

  “You’re talking about Domitius, I presume?”

  I nodded.

  “He’s a good man,” Balbus said quietly.

  “As is Torquatus,” I replied.

  With that, we toasted each other, men who for different reasons had suffered the same result, the loss of their nearest and dearest friend, not to a blade but to affairs of the human heart.

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  I was almost immediately overwhelmed in my new role of Primus Pilus of a full Legion, causing me to begin fretting about the appearance of Diocles, finally recognizing how much I had come to rely on him. During the interval, I appropriated slaves with experience in the daily running of the Legion from the other Centurions. Zeno had died of an illness while the Legion was camped outside Rome, or I would have used him, despite his light-fingered ways. Still, it was not the same as having Diocles with me, so I am afraid that my temper was very much on the raw with not just the slaves, but anyone who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

  The larger situation did not help my mood either. Weather was atrocious, seemingly unending days of unfavorable winds accompanied by fits of rain that made the camp a morass of mud that clung to everything. Despite Caesar’s impatience, this weather was still a blessing because it allowed time for all the forces he had sent for to arrive, since some were coming from as far away as Egypt, the 28th in particular. When I heard this news, while I was happy at the thought of seeing Cartufenus again, I was not particularly thrilled with the idea of the 28th being part of the invasion, the memory of their performance in Alexandria still fresh in my mind. The 25th, 26th, and 29th were coming as well, along with the rest of the Spanish Legions, though so far only the 10th had arrived. Other issues facing Caesar were shipping, along with supply, neither situations being sufficient for his plans or ambitions, but that never stopped Caesar and finally, he could take it no longer. The day after Saturnalia, I was ordered to load four Cohorts of the Legion, all that fit on the available shipping, along with Caesar, the cavalry and some auxiliaries, about 3,000 men total. As he had at Brundisium, Caesar ordered all unnecessary baggage to be left behind, along with body slaves, which did not affect me in any way since Diocles had not arrived. We put out to sea, where almost immediately, the choppy conditions we had experienced in the harbor and immediately surrounding waters turned to heaving seas, sending a number of men to the side. I had finally gotten to the point where my stomach was, if not accustomed to sea voyages, at least inured to the point where it took a full-blown storm before it finally rebelled. That is not to say that I was comfortable; I certainly was not, but I was happy that the voyage was fairly short, or at least so I thought. The distance to cover was a little more than a hundred miles by sea, yet it took five full days before we dropped anchor at Hadrumentum, after hugging the coast, only stopping briefly at a number of points while Caesar decided the best place to land.

  At Hadrumentum, the gates were closed to us, the garrison commander, one Gaius Considius, having close to two Legions’ worth of men manning the walls and gates, so we made camp in sight of the walls of the city, while Caesar went surveying the city defenses. Also, as we were making camp, scouts were sent out into the countryside, and they came back to report that a second force composed of mostly cavalry approached from the direction of Clunea. This was one of the points we had stopped for Caesar to scout and had rejected because it was too heavily defended, so they had obviously been alerted, understanding who we were and what we were about. One of the Tribunes with us, Lucius Plancus, made a suggestion to Caesar that he try to talk Considius over to our side, since Plancus knew him from before the civil war, to which Caesar agreed. Caesar wrote a letter for Plancus to take to Considius under a flag of truce and, with letter in hand, Plancus approached the city walls. He was taken into the presence of Considius, who apparently
did not share the same warm memories of their friendship that Plancus had, because as an answer not only did he not bother to open the letter with Caesar’s seal but executed Plancus on the spot. This was not made known to us immediately; instead, we spent that night and the better part of the next day waiting for some sort of answer from Considius, while there was much wagering on the fate of Plancus ranging from defection to the Pompeians to losing his head. The other reason Caesar chose to wait was to allow the rest of the army to join us, but there was no sign of the fleet that had supposedly been just one or two days away from Sicily when we left. However, this was not altogether surprising given the weather we experienced ourselves. It was the last day of the year of the Consulship of Calenus and Vatinius, except that was under the old calendar before Caesar reformed it. In other words, it was still October according to the new calendar, but on the first day of the “old” new year, Caesar decided that he could not afford to spend the time investing Hadrumentum now that he had learned of the fate of Plancus, particularly with the large force of cavalry from Clunea less than a day away. The numbers that the scouts had reported of the cavalry force was in excess of 3,000, compared to our 150 mounted troops, with the assumption being that they were the Gauls of Labienus’ force that escaped after Pharsalus. Breaking camp, Caesar decided to leave us as a rearguard then set off with only the cavalry, the auxiliaries and the bulk of his staff. Heading in the opposite direction from which the enemy cavalry was coming, Caesar made for the city of Ruspina. They were barely out of sight when the mounted scouts assigned to us reported the cloud of dust that marked the Pompeian cavalry, and who had obviously been warned of our presence because a couple of thirds of a watch later when they came close to our marching formation, they gave us a wide berth. However, they did pass closely enough for us to see that they were not Gauls, their darker skin and lighter armor making that clearly apparent.

  “Numidians,” Scribonius said, causing me to look at him in surprise as we marched together.

  “And how do you know that? When did you ever see a Numidian?”

  Suddenly he looked wary, glancing quickly around to make sure that nobody else was in earshot before he answered. “I saw some when I was a child in Rome. They were associated with King Jugurtha in some way, but I don’t remember how. They looked and rode their horses the same way as those men do.”

  Scribonius had become my closest friend, yet this moment reminded me how little I really knew about him. In contrast, between Vibius and me, Scribonius had learned probably more about our childhood and background than he ever wanted to know. Yet, when that moment came around the fire when men talked of home, Scribonius always remained silent, something we had just come to accept, never questioning him about it. I did not press then, since it was not the time or place, indeed, if there was one to begin with. Instead, we watched the cavalry streaming past us, shaking their arms at us while calling out threats in yet one more language we did not understand. Of course, our men replied in turn, marching along while shouting at the enemy what we would do to them if given the chance. I never really understood the point in all of this nonsense, but it was something that seemed to be important to the men even now after doing it for 15 years without influencing one battle. The enemy soon receded out of our sight in pursuit of Caesar and our cavalry, so now all we could do was wait, which is the hardest part of any campaign. Even worse than boredom is when things are happening, but you do not know the outcome of events, having to wait to hear the news that determines whether or not there is cause to celebrate or reason to panic. The numbers of enemy cavalry were certainly daunting, when compared to our own numbers, except at that point we did not know the quality of the Numidians, making it anyone’s guess as to what would happen.

  While the major part of the fleet that brought us to Africa had been sent back to Sicily to load the hopefully newly arrived reinforcements to bring to us, Caesar’s flagship, a quinquereme, along with a small number of other ships were sticking close to shore, following Caesar’s progress. If matters became desperate, I was not too worried about Caesar, knowing that he would retreat to the safety of the flagship, the cavalry buying the necessary time with their lives for his escape. As it turned out, this would not be necessary. When the enemy cavalry approached Caesar and our own forces, our paltry band of horsemen turned about, charging into the Numidians and cutting a fair number of them down before the rest scattered to the four winds. Not only did this save Caesar from the embarrassment of having to run for the fleet, it also gave him and the rest of the army a good idea of the measure of the Numidians, at least their cavalry, which was not much. Camp was made that night at Ruspina, which unlike Hadrumentum, had opened their gates to us. Meanwhile, the only sighting of the enemy was their scouts and the Numidians who skulked a short distance away meaning we had no trouble that night, before marching further east the few miles to Leptis the next day, camping outside the town.

  Despite arriving early because of the short distance between Ruspina and Leptis, we still spent the best part of the day building the camp, since we had to make it big enough to accommodate the rest of the army, which still had not shown up. By the end of the day, the men were exhausted, yet we still did not have the camp completed because of the size. This meant that we had to mount full Cohort guard through the night to protect the unfinished sides of the camp, something that did not please Caesar in the slightest, though he had to accept it. Fortunately, the fleet carrying the rest of the army showed up early the next day. By midday, the first of the rest of the army from Sicily began jumping over the sides of the transports to wade ashore, cheering my men greatly. We continued working, while I kept an eye out for the rest of our Legion, but as the day passed, I did not see them. Finally, I went to the Praetorium to find Apollonius, asking him if he knew where the rest of the 10th was.

  “Sallustius said that he couldn’t fit everyone into the available shipping and decided to send over the rest of what just arrived.”

  I did not like this, but there was nothing to be done about it. The Legions that landed were the 25th, 26th, 28th, 29th, and all but two Cohorts of the 5th, which had been in Greece all this time, minus some Cohorts from each of the Legions whose ships had still not landed. I was at least thankful that the men of the arriving Legions were put immediately to work, so that the camp was completed by the end of the day, despite the grumbling of my men. I was also happy to see Cartufenus again, and we spent the evening in my tent catching up.

  “It must be good to be back with the 10th.” Cartufenus observed me closely as he said this.

  Of course, by this time, the news of all that had transpired on the Campus Martius was common knowledge throughout the army, and I thought I could detect a hint of smugness in his tone, for which I guess I cannot fully blame him. I had made my feelings about the 28th’s actions in Alexandria fairly clear, and now here was the vaunted 10th doing the same thing, at least as far as Cartufenus was concerned. I thought about pointing out that the 10th had not mutinied while under siege, and there was no real comparison between the length and quality of our service, then decided against it, since he had not really voiced any of the things I thought were running through his head.

  Instead, I answered the question he had verbalized. “Yes and no,” I admitted.

  Cartufenus knew about what had happened between Vibius and me at Pharsalus, having blurted the story out during a wine-filled evening back in Alexandria, so I felt comfortable confiding in him. “It’s still early. I’ve only been Primus Pilus for a few weeks and I haven’t had much time with the men. I have my ideas about who I have to keep my eye on as far as Centurions and Optios, but only time will tell if I’m right.”

  “What will you do if they mutiny again?”

  “Whatever I have to,” I replied.

  He raised his cup. “Hopefully, it will never come to that.”

  ~ ~ ~ ~

  As at Ruspina, the gates of Leptis were thrown open to us, and in order to prevent any problems
with the men, Caesar ordered a Century to guard each town gate with orders that no man from the army be allowed in, to ensure there was no theft. Caesar was determined to win the populace over to him and these were the kinds of measures he was taking to win their trust. Leptis was to be our supply base, so we built the camp right up to the water’s edge to allow for easier unloading. At Leptis, I learned that the missing ships were supposedly heading by mistake for Utica, which was in Pompeian hands, held by none other than Cato, and Caesar was worried that the men and supplies aboard would fall into enemy hands. Because of the danger, he decided that he would go himself in search of the missing vessels and men, along with some of us. I was ordered to load up my Cohorts, along with four Cohorts of the 25th, which we did that night, enduring a miserable night on the water, set to depart before dawn. Our fleet rowed out of the small harbor of Leptis shortly before daybreak, but luckily, we were not a third of a watch gone past sunrise when a lookout shouted down from the mast where he was perched that he had spied a sail, quickly followed by another, then others. At first, we thought it might be the enemy, so there was much commotion as the crew of the ship I was on hurried about making ready to fight. Soon enough, it became apparent that they belonged to us, since each vessel flew Caesar’s red standard. Consequently, we turned back, going back to Ruspina instead of Leptis to debark, along with the missing Cohorts of the other Legions, but precious little in the way of supplies. This concerned Caesar most of all, knowing that he could not have a hungry army for what lay ahead. To that end, he dispatched Sallustius to the island of Cercina, where there was supposedly a large supply of grain, and a messenger was sent to Sardinia for the same purpose. Caesar ordered a Cohort from each Legion, including from the 10th, to stay at Leptis under one of the Saserna brothers, though I could never tell them apart, to guard what would be our supply base. I sent Glaxus and his Cohort, confident that he was sufficiently intelligent and resourceful enough to handle an independent command, a judgment that he more than validated during that duty. The rest of the army came to Ruspina from Leptis, and although it was a short distance, there was plenty of grumbling about marching back and forth. Once the disposition of our forces was settled, Caesar gave orders that we were to go about the countryside to procure grain and other foodstuffs so that there would be something to put in our supply base at Leptis. We would leave the next morning to go a few miles south where there were reports of fields of ripened grain supposedly just waiting to be harvested by us.