A glitter of sabres

A trumpet sounded, and across the Islamgee plain I saw a glitter of sabres where a squadron of bearded sowars were cantering to meet them — Bombay Lights, I’m told, and just the boys to do Theodore’s homework for him if he lingered.


Flashman on the March, p.262, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2005.


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Run through!

      What is it like to be run through? I'll tell you. For an instant, nothing. Then hideous, tearing agony for another instant — and then nothing again as you see the blade withdrawn and the blood welling on your shirt, for the pain is lost in shock and disbelief as your eyes meet your assailant's. It's a long moment, that, in which you realise you ain't dead, and that he's about to launch another thrust to finish you — and it's remarkable how swiftly you can move then, with a hole clean through you from front to back, about midway between your navel and your hip, and sprouting gore like a pump.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.153, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


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Slicing at my neck

      God, he was quick! One whip of his hand and his blade was slicing at my neck, and if I hadn't practised my favourite retire, which is to fall backwards, howling, my head would have been on the carpet.


Flashman and the Tiger, p.149, Harper Collins, paperback edition 2000.


Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, fencing.

In which Lt. Flashman reviews the tactics of Sir Hugh Gough

I caught my breath in horror, for it was Ferozeshah all over again, with that raving old spud-walloper risking everything on the sabre and the bayonet, hand to hand — but then the Sikhs were groggy from Moodkee, in positions hastily dug and manned, while now the were entrenched in a miniature Torres Vedras, with ditch-and-dyke works twenty feet high, enfiladed by murderous camel-swivels and packed with tulwar-swinging lunatics fairly itching to die for the Guru. You can’t do it, Paddy, thinks I, it won’t answer this time, you’ll break your great thick Irish head against this fortress of shot and steel, and have your army torn to ribbons, and lose the war, and never see Tipperary again, you benighted old bog-trotter, you —


Flashman and the Mountain of Light, p.331, Fontana Paperback edition, 1991.



Tags: Flashman, Flashman quotes, tactics.

A nice dark corner

Old dungeon-fighters like myself – and I’ve had a wealth of experience, from the vaults of Jotunberg, where I was sabre to sabre with Starnberg, to that Afghan prison where I let dear old Hudson take the strain – know that the thing to do on these occasions is find a nice dark corner and crawl into it.

Flashman at the Charge, p.227, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

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The width of a sabre blade

I’ll tell you something else, which military historians never realize: they call the Crimea a disaster, which it was, and a hideous botch-up by our staff and supply, which is also true, but what they don’t know is that with all these things in the balance against you, the difference between hellish catastrophe and brilliant success is sometimes no greater than the width of a sabre blade, but when all is over no one thinks of that. Win gloriously - and the clever dicks forget all about the rickety ambulances that never came, and the rations that were rotten, and the boots that didn’t fit, and the generals who’d have been better employed hawking bedpans round the doors. Lose – and these are the only things they talk about.

Flashman at the Charge, pp.41-2, Pan edition, 5th printing, 1979.

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Enough to convince me

Unlike Mr Rassendyll I did not exercise myself daily in arms in expectation of trying another round with him: one was enough to convince me that with a fellow like young Rudi the best weapon you can have is a long pair of legs and a good start.

Royal Flash, p.271, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1978.

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The old Flashman triple pass

…as he cut at me and missed he staggered, and in desperation I tried the old Flashman triple pass – a sudden thrust at the face, a tremendous kick at his essentials, and a full-blooded downward cut. But where I had been to school, Rudi had graduated with honours; he side-stepped the thrust and kick, and if I hadn’t postponed my intended cut in favour of an original parry – a blind sideways sweep accompanied by a squeal of alarm – he would have had me.

Royal Flash, p.229-30, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1978.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.

Roaring your heart out

…and if I have to use one [a sabre] I’d rather it wasn’t in single combat, but in a mêlée, where you can hang about on the outskirts, roaring your heart out and waiting for an opponent with his back turned.

Royal Flash, p.123, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1978.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.

Young and raw

When you are young and raw and on the brink of adventure, you set great store by having your side-arms just right, because you are full of romantic notions of how you will use them. Even I felt a thrill when I first handled a sabre at practice with the 11th Light Dragoons, and imagined myself pinking and mowing down hordes of ferocious but obligingly futile enemies. But when you’ve seen a sabre cut to the bone, and limbs mangled by bullets, you come out of your daydream pretty sharp.

Royal Flash, pp.67 - 68, Pan edition, 8th printing, 1978.

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Flashman, Flashman quotes.

Thomas Arnold

He was standing before the fireplace, with his hands behind looping up his coat-tails, and a face like Turk at a christening. He had eyes like sabre-points, and his face was pale and carried that disgusted look that he kept for these occasions.



Flashman, p. 14, Pan edition 12th printing, 1979.

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