night-attacks

Updated: June 25, 2025

In time of peace, a quiet, humorous, dour and religious-minded man, he was now a stern disciplinarian and a cunning foe who fought to kill, rejoicing in the carnage that taught a lesson and made for earlier peace. The mind that had dreamed of universal brotherhood and the Oneness of Humanity now dreamed of ambushes, night-attacks, slaughterous strategy and magazine-fire on a cornered foe.

Percival Christopher Wren - Driftwood Spars: The Stories of a Man, a Boy, a Woman, and Certain Other People Who: Strangely Met Upon the Sea of Life

It is for this reason that I would ever discourage night-attacks, unless you can rely on your men. They generally fail: because the man of common bravery, who would acquit himself fairly in broad daylight, will hang back during the night. Fear and darkness have always been firm allies; and are inseparably playing into each other's hands.

Frederick Marryat - Frank Mildmay : Or, the Naval Officer

Here the infantry of Caesar overtook them and encamped opposite to them in the evening and during the night, as the nocturnal march which the Pompeians had at first contemplated was abandoned from fear of the night-attacks of the cavalry. On the following day also both armies remained immoveable, occupied only in reconnoitering the country. The Route to the Ebro Closed

Theodor Mommsen - The History of Rome, Book V : The Establishment of the Military Monarchy

There was, however, a humorous side to this desolate picture, which I must now relate, as it shows that, notwithstanding the state of dejection to which we had been reduced, there still lurked a spirit of fun and mischief among the officers. For some time after the revolt we had "night-attacks" on the brain.

Charles John Griffiths - A Narrative of the Siege of Delhi: With an Account of the Mutiny at Ferozepore in 1857