Supplemental Backstory: The Expansion of Equestria under the Alternia Regency Part 2: The Equestrian Civil War · 3:27am Jul 30th, 2017
So, I'm on holiday for a while. I'll have internet, I'll be on, though not so much for the first week. Expect continued updates of Samudra's Journal because I have lots of pre-written chapters as Zervziel will attest. In the meantime, enjoy.
The Equestrian Civil War
Other names: The Rebellion of Gladius Greatwing, The Cloudsdale Rebellion
In 470 AR, Alternia decided to reform the government according to the advice provided by the Equestrian pegasus political philosopher, Eagle-Eye. She created a parliament where Lords and representatives from the subjects of Equestria could vote. This was partially due to the fact that the weak and ineffective noble houses still had a disproportionate amount of power over the running of Equestria and the new and highly intelligent bourgeois were growing increasingly frustrated. Thus, Alternia decided to kill two birds with one stone and create a constitutional monarchy that would better assist her in administering Equestria. The administration was getting far too big for her to oversee.
But she unfortunately caused a monster to rear its ugly head. The First Equestrian Parliament worked at first and worked fairly well. Thirty years later though, just after Eagle-Eye died in 500 AR, the parliament had descended into factionalism. Factionalism that would create catastrophe.
The earth ponies and unicorn bourgeois had formed a coalition that opposed the pegasi led by the Carrot earth pony Clan and the Glimmer unicorn Family. They were making increasing demands on the pegasi to assist with their expansion and exploration of Equestria, and continued to ignore the pegasi demands for an increased role in Equestria’s running and military expansion. Since the nobility, which saw eye to eye due to their equal social statuses, lacked influence in a parliament that employed representation by population, the pegasi, unicorn and earth pony lords simply couldn’t oppose this coalition, even with the support of the pegasi delegates. It didn’t help that the pegasi were growing increasingly impoverished in this new Equestria due to unequal rules Earth and Unicorn bourgeois had introduced to assist the growth of their business at the expense of the pegasi.
Alternia and her direct supports were unfortunately, not powerful enough to stop this. The rules of the Parliament curtailed what they could do. They argued constantly and it became very well known to the increasingly horrified public that the Equestrian Crown itself was opposing the motions of the earth and unicorn bourgeois. But this opposition could not overrule the vote of the representatives, politicians that were no longer representing their constituents, and instead voting for the interest of a “party”.
So the pegasi fell back to the only thing they had left. Their military traditions. Under Exarch Gladius Greatwing, the pegasi faction became increasingly hostile and downright disobedient toward Crown rule and the parliament’s resolutions. They also began to rapidly militarize.
Alternia tried to negotiate with Gladius Greatwing. It is widely known he had served in her personal guard and had been a lover of hers for a time, before they had both ended the relationship. It is said that she never fully trusted Gladius for reasons even she later on, had difficulty explaining. Whatever the cause of her mistrust, (this author supposes that it was simply good changeling instincts), Gladius quickly revealed his true loyalties in 501CR, when Cloudsdale rebelled as did Las Pegasus and the old pegasi city of Stormwrath.
A thousand of Gladius’s pegasi launched a raid on Canterlot, causing the Great Canterlot Fire that burned down most of the city, except for the castle, which had been saved by Princess Alternia herself taking the field and putting it out. However, while the castle was saved, the parliament building was burned down and the centre of Equestrian commerce was in ruins, with thousands of civilian casualties. He had also inflicted hundreds of casualties on Alternia’s personal troops, known then as the Canterlot Guard.
Immediately afterward, Gladius Greatwing crowned himself King Gladius of the Appoline Empire, and claimed the Equestrian throne and government for himself.
In response Duke Imperator Carrot and his wife, Duchess Amethyst Glimmer summoned their armies. Despite Princess Alternia asking them not to meet Gladius and wait until they could formulate a united response, the pair marched to meet Gladius’s army on the field. One might think they were simply overconfident, but the recent opening of some of Princess Alternia’s personal diary entries related to the crisis as well as other cabinet documents and memoirs indicate they had a more sinister motive.
By admission of the treaties they signed together (that Alternia’s spies had managed to copy), such as the Imperator-Amethyst Pact, it is clear that Imperator Carrot and Amethyst Glimmer also had aspirations for the Equestrian Crown. They wanted to be the first to defeat Gladius and then after that, march on Canterlot. That way they could remove the two obstacles to their power in one fell swoop.
At the Battle of Neighagra Falls, Imperator Carrot and Amethyst Glimmer brought nearly ten thousand unicorns and earth ponies. Half of them were ponies at arms with good quality weapons and good at sorcery. Gladius Greatwing brought eight thousand of his pegasi. All of them were equipped with relatively out of date weapons, but were incredibly enthusiastic and yet, disciplined.
Moreover, Imperator and Amethyst had already made a key mistake. Their army was camped astride the Neighagra river, split in two halves, linked by the Striding Bridge. Granted, attacking was risky as the forests they were camped in would heavily impede the pegasi’s attempts to swoop in. But Gladius didn’t hesitate to exploit this weakness.
In an unprecedented strategic move, he split his smaller army into two and encircled the Glimmer-Carrot Army, laying siege to their positions. After starving them for nearly two weeks, he launched a simultaneous attack from both sides. In this manner, he drove hundreds of starving earth ponies and unicorns into the river, where the current and their heavy armor drowned them. Imperator Carrot and Amethyst Glimmer were amongst those that were drowned, and legend has it they died squabbling over who got to get on a log as they were thrown down the Neighagra Falls.
Gladius did take heavy casualties though, losing his second-in command, Axe Wind. Three thousand pegasi and five thousand earth ponies and unicorns were dead, wounded, though most were simply missing. Drowned in the Neighagra River. Gladius still retained his army though compared to the unicorns and earth ponies who scattered. As such, he could just march onto Canterlot, but he didn’t.
It’s suspected that Gladius was wary of Canterlot’s defenses thanks to his studying of the Yakyakhistan’s defeat at the Foot of Canterlot Mountain. He was also probably wary of meeting the remaining Canterlot Guard, an army in its own right numbering 5,000 earth ponies, unicorns and pegasi, and possibly Alternia herself in the field. Gladius knew “Celestia” wasn’t a fighter, but her magic was still something to be concerned about. So he spent two months recruiting, while also planning his approach and siege to the city. His subordinates in the meantime took Vanhoofer, Baltimare and Fillydelphia.
Unsurprisingly, Alternia took full advantage of Gladius’s caution to completely reform the Equestrian Army. She disbanded all levies, sending them to either training camps, to farms, or to produce arms, and instead, mostly out of her own pocket, raised a centralized, professional army based on professional infantry regiments. The Royal Guard being the first. It was composed of ponies previously from the Canterlot Guard and pegasi loyalists who had sided with the Equestrian Crown over Gladius Greatwing.
The first battle of this Royal Guard, was a clash between five hundred of its pegasi against six hundred Cloudsdale Pegasi in the Battle of Whitetail Woods. The so-called Dragoon Guard, then the pegasi sub-brigade of the Royal Guard, were led the mare that would become the legendary “Lady” Voulge, First Captain of the Royal Guard. She had limited military experience, having only served in the Canterlot Guard for a time and fought in the Raid on Canterlot. The Cloudsdale Pegasi were led by Gladius Greatwing’s son, Halberd Greatwing, and were all battle-hardened. As such, the Cloudsdale pegasi forced the Dragoon Guard off the field, but it would be the only time they were able to do so.
The reason was Voulge herself. “Lady” Voulge’s life is the subject of many a popular biography, and for good reason. She was born to a earth pony innkeeper in the slums of Canterlot. She also had a rather unusual coloration for a pony at the time, pure, almost bone white with a dark blue mane and bright blue eyes. Most ponies, at the time didn’t have that kind of sharp coloration.
Perhaps unsurprisingly, she harboured a rather large resentment for the Equestrian Crown, the nobility and the bourgeois. She had grown up poor, starving and in the streets where she made a name in illegal fighting tournaments, using her preferred weapon, a sabre. The reason she joined the Canterlot Guard was because she needed the money. As for why she didn’t join Gladius’s rebellion? She was aware that she was actually his bastard and he had abandoned her mother the moment he had found out she was pregnant.
During the Raid on Canterlot though, Princess Alternia (while protecting the city) saved Voulge’s life (amongst many others) and spent hours on the field, healing the wounded, and opening up the castle for residence by ponies from all walks of life. According to Voulge’s personal memoirs, she guarded the exhausted princess for the night and worked closely with her in training and forming the Royal Guard. As the most senior officer that survived the Canterlot Raid, Voulge was made its first captain.
At first, the captaincy seemed like it was going to be a short one. Voulge’s failure at the Battle of Whitetail Woods led to much public and private speculation of her past, which was when everypony found out she was Gladius’s bastard daughter. Somepony had spied on Voulge saying goodbye to her mother on her deathbed.
Voulge expected to be vilified and discarded by the Royals. Her memoir notes she had many admirers in the guard, but few political allies. Her longtime friendship with Blueblood the 10th hadn’t been formed yet. Princess Alternia had asked Voulge to come by regularly to her chambers to chat, but she had always thought this was the Princess just trying to maintain a working relationship with her captain.
Alternia stepped in though and supported Voulge, noting that she had personally wounded Halberd Greatwing and preserved the Dragoon Guard, more than what many of her detractors had done. Voulge indicates that this was when she and her sovereign first recognized each other as friends.
After ensuring Voulge’s brigade was replenished by more troops, Alternia considered which of her generals would command the Royal Guard, but the unanimous declaration by the regiment was for Voulge to lead it. As such, Alternia promoted Voulge to Colonel and put her, and her Royal Guard and Dragoon Guard under Prince Blueblood the 10th, who also led the last unicorn knights and earth pony bannerponies. Their orders were to seize the pegasi fortress of Stormwrath, located near the Foal Mountains east of Canterlot.
Stormwrath’s forces, which had been reinforced by Halberd Greatwing, sallied forth to meet them, numbering 7,000 pegasi. They met the Crown army composed of 4,000 earth ponies, 3,000 unicorns and the 1,500 Dragoon Guard. The discipline of the Crown Army and a surprise flank attack by Voulge’s Dragoon Guard, forced the Stormwrath forces to flee to the city. In the battle, Voulge captured Halberd Greatwing as well. As the earth pony, unicorns and pegasi prepared to lay siege to the ancient cloud city though, the pegasi turned Stormwrath itself into a massive storm in a last-ditch attempt to drown the Royalists. Only the weather-managing attempts by the Dragoon Guard, the magic of the unicorns, and the strength of the earth ponies that threw up levees as quickly as they could managed to save the Royalists. Stormwrath though, was lost and it and the forces that garrisoned it were a huge loss to the forces of the Cloudsdale Rebellion.
Still under the overall command of Blueblood the 10th, the Royal Army marched south to Fillydelphia, seizing it after a lightning siege before proceeding to Baltimare. Here, they were joined by the 88th Manehattan Ranger Regiment (Formerly the Pudd’n head Brigade) under Quintus Valorus and his second in command Titus Puller. Baltimare was a far more difficult siege, forcing the Royal Army to stay in place for nearly three months.
That was when Blueblood 10th got word from Equestria’s Spymaster, Master Littlehoof, that the Apolline Army was making its way to Canterlot.
Immediately, Blueblood took the Royal Guard and the Dragoon Guard, leaving the Manehattan Rangers to maintain the siege, and marched back to Canterlot. This was where they intercepted Gladius’s army at the Battle of Cloudsdale.
For you see, Gladius had decided to move Cloudsdale itself as a massive siege platform to attack Canterlot. It was a bold, and if he had managed to employ it, would have probably been an effective strategy.
We would never know because Blueblood and Voulge’s forces brought Gladius and his son Spatha Greatwing into battle.
The numbers were quite evenly matched. The Royalists fielded six thousand earth ponies, four thousand unicorns, and one thousand five hundred Dragoon Guard. The Apolline forces under Gladius composed of fifteen thousand pegasi, but more than five thousand of these ponies were conscripts from the city itself. Some of them little older than foals.
Voulge’s strategy was quite simple. Gladius wanted to use Cloudsdale itself as a launching platform for the Apolline forces against the Equestrian Army. Take Cloudsdale like a boarding party takes a ship. Change the battlefield into Cloudsdale itself and they could deny the pegasi the mobility they preferred.
Unicorns created arrays that would automatically apply Cloudwalking spells to land ponies. The Dragoon Guard harnessed themselves to chariots that would take two ponies per chariot.
In the cover of darkness, the Dragoon Guard charged in at high speed. They deployed nearly three thousand Royalists onto Cloudsdale in the first hour. Three hours later, six thousand Royalists were in Cloudsdale. Thrown into chaos by the night attack, the darkness highly impeding the pegasi ability to make mobile strikes, and being completely unable to match the earth ponies and unicorns head to head, the Royalists routed the forces garrisoned on Cloudsdale proper.
Gladius, unsure about the number of troops he was facing due to being fed false information by Alternia’s spies, was forced to withdraw from Cloudsdale.
By morning, Gladius could see Royal Flags flying over Cloudsdale and the failing morale of his army, who were already lacking food and now had none thanks to Cloudsdale being captured.
He had two options, which Prince Blueblood presented to him. Surrender and be treated mercifully, or attack and lose his entire army.
Unfortunately, Gladius chose to attack, riling up his troops, he led them in a massed charge at Cloudsdale. Earth pony ballistas that had been spelled and maneuvered onto Cloudsdale the night before, cut down many of the front rankers, whilst unicorn spells stopped those following. The Dragoon Guard kept anyone who did get too close from harassing the Royal Guard.
By battle’s end, the Royalists lost over two thousand ponies. Five hundred of them pegasi.
The Cloudsdale Rebels had lost more than seven thousand ponies. Quite a number of them very young pegasi. Gladius had perished along with his son Spatha Greatwing. His wife Valkyrie Stormwind sued for peace.
So in 502AR Alternia signed the peace treaty with Valkyrie, allowing the rebels to reintegrate back into society. This was going to be incredibly difficult. Alternia’s first step was to disband the First Equestrian Parliament and create the United Parliament, a more complicated system where nobles and elected representatives held equal sway, but the noble representatives had to earn their positions through civil or military service.
This was a big step, but controversial, in that Alternia allowed a number of rebel leaders to maintain their position. Valkyrie Greatwing nee Dust was one of these leaders.
On the other hoof, Alternia also balanced the pegasi nobles with a number of representatives that she picked from loyal subjects, including Voulge, who became Countess of Rainbow Falls and Captain of both Royal Guard and Dragoon Guards.
The compromise didn’t fully satisfy anybody, but kept further thoughts of rebellion to a dull murmur, especially since Voulge and Blueblood, amongst others, still supported Alternia. Granted, it wasn’t too difficult to get Voulge’s support given that by this point, the two were romantically involved. Voulge was courting Alternia openly.
What really buried the resentment that the pony races had for each other was the 2nd Griffonian War that took place only two years after the Equestrian Civil War.
So I study military history as a hobby and this was incredibly well done the tactics were sound and the sequence of events felt organic. Very well done and thank you for sharing this with us.
Might we get a similar article for the second griffin war that would be amazing.
I would also love to discuss pony war tactic theory if you ever want to pm me.
Very interesting
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the 2nd one on the griffon war will come... after I settle back down in my holidy home :P
Well this was awesome, I can't wait for the next one.
man those be some serious losses
the population of equestria seems on the rather small side, so that had to hurt in so many ways
Then to go right into another war. ouch.