The men waiting for Hitler’s Panzers rode horses.
Nazi propaganda portrayed them as idiots.
The truth was very very different!
On September 1, 1939, Germany’s 4th Panzer Division advanced toward Mokra, Poland.
Standing in its way was the Wołyńska Cavalry Brigade.
But the Poles did not charge the tanks with lances. Their horses provided mobility. The cavalrymen dismounted and fought from prepared positions with antitank guns, artillery, antitank rifles, and the armored train Śmiały.
Again and again, the panzers attacked.
Again and again, the Poles stopped them.
The myth was born elsewhere that same day.
At Krojanty, Polish uhlans charged and scattered exposed German motorized infantry before armored cars arrived and opened fire. German officers later brought foreign correspondents - including Italian journalist Indro Montanelli - to see dead cavalrymen and horses beside armored vehicles that had arrived after the fight.
Montanelli reported that Polish horsemen had charged German tanks. Nazi propaganda seized upon the story. It offered the perfect image: intelligent, modern Germans crushing stupid Poles who rode against steel with lances.
It was meant to prove German military and racial superiority. And it was a lie.
Polish cavalry never launched a suicidal charge against panzers. And at Mokra, it stopped an entire panzer division!
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