At the same time, the Russian Army's defensive line at Minsk began to crumble under wave after wave of assaults by General Wojciechowski's Polish Left Wing Legion.
To wash away the shame of fleeing their positions early the day before, the Parma Artillery, under the command of a French company commander, pushed to within barely five hundred paces of the enemy. Braving the artillery fire that filled the sky, they began bombarding the Russian positions.
Before long, when a shell shattered one of the Russian Army's banners, vast numbers of Polish soldiers immediately surged toward the spot like a tidal wave.
Having had large numbers of troops redeployed elsewhere, the Russian defensive line could no longer hold. The breach rapidly widened, and by noon the next day, all of southwestern Minsk had fallen under Polish Army control.
Janik, meanwhile, had been thrown unconscious when his mount was hit during the fighting that morning. He did not wake until now.
Still dazed, he grabbed the military surgeon and asked anxiously, "How is the battle... going?"
Hearing the commotion, his staff officer hurried in from outside the tent. "Are you feeling better? The Russians we surrounded have surrendered. There seem to be more than three thousand of them!"
Janik fell heavily back onto his pillow and let out a breath. "We finally avenged them!"
His staff officer continued, "General Madalinski is attacking Minsk now. They say Marshal Kościuszko himself has come to the front."
Janik nodded. After waiting for quite a while, he finally asked again, "How many men... do we have left?"
The staff officer lowered his head. "Two thousand three hundred, Lieutenant Colonel. The General Staff Headquarters has ordered us back to Lida to rest and reorganize. The soldiers still able to fight have been incorporated into the Royal 4th