Battle of Warsaw 1656, July 28-30th

 Salvete Omnes,

the famous battle in the fields of Warsaw's suburb Praga took place between July 28th to 31st, 1656AD.

King of Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Swedish king saw their forces struggle for supremacy and glory, while soldier and their horses  fought the actual battle

Carolus X Gustavus

The events of July 29th, i.e., the maneuvers and epic fighting of  the second day are the most notoriously debated - it was the day of the Polish (actually the grand duchy) winged hussars banners famous charge[1] against the allied armies commanded  by the Swedish king.

This three day battle ended in a tactical victory of the Brandenburg-Swedish allies, but Swedish king Charles X Gustavus failed to destroy or even dent the main body of the Polish king's army, and in winning this battle the Swedish side faced again and again the guerilla-style warfare  waged by Stefan Czarniecki and other Polish commanders. On the other hand the withdrawal of the Polish forces from Warsaw led to another surrender of the city and the infamous pillages carried by the allied Swedes and Brandeburg-Prussian soldateska continued for another season..  
We are fortunate to have several prints made by Erik Dahlberg, who participated in the battle, of this momentous event in military history. And some primary sources writtten by this battle's participants, including Lithuanian magnate, Boguslaw Radziwill, who fought on the allied side against his king and country. 

Swedish-Prusian-Brandenburg forces come south from Nowy Dwor

the Polish king's army included an allied light cavalry Crimean Khanate Tatar contingent. Its size has been variously interpreted from the sources (like our Polish participant and poet Wespazjan Kochowski gave the size of the Tatar division at 6,000)  - see the XIX century German researcher August Riese's assessment from a German 1870 book on the battle.

Johan Philip Lemke painted the battle, here a detail from his painting showing winged Tatars with short cirit javelins and swords

I may write more about what the present Polish scholarship presents about the numbers of the king's army 28-30th July 1656.
..to be continued

ps

I could note here that we also have the memoirs or recollection of a westerner on the Polish side, namely, shortly after the battle a certain Scottish officer in Polish service (since March 1656) one Patrick Gordon was taken prisoner by the Brandenburgian soldiers, and general Douglas of the Swedish army came to his rescue, so to speak, hence Gordon went to serve his old masters, the Swedish king's army, but was to be taken prisoner several more times during the Deluge, and eventually ended up in the Muscovite army where he became one of the most strongest supporters of tsar Peter I. But this is for another day.
[1]My friend Radoslaw Sikora wrote a chapter in his dissertation on the winged hussar charge at Warsaw. I may do a little synopsis of his findings.

Valete