Quintus Tullius Cicero Receiving News

Quintus Tullius Cicero, the little brother of the more famous orator Marcus Tullius Cicero, was an officer under Gaius Julius Caesar (THE Caesar) in the Gallic Wars. In 54 BC, One Gallic rebellion opened up with the destruction of one legion commanded by Cotta by ambush (all 15 cohorts destroyed as fighting units less than 50 total survivors according to Caesar) at Atuatuca Tungrorum and the next target was Quintus Tullius Cicero's fort.

Pretty much no one knew about the destruction of the legion until Quintus Tullius Cicero was put under siege. The Gauls demanded the legion surrender and pointed out the destruction of the previous legion. Quintus held his ground during the siege of the winter fort while he tried to contact Caesar. The first few messengers got killed but after a few days a cavalryman who knew the Celtic language got the idea to dress like a Gaul and slipped through. Caesar ended up relieving the siege. The survivors of the ambushed legion, presumably lost in hostile territory, didn't show up for a month after Quintus's fort was saved (which is presumably why the Romans even knew how that unit was destroyed so Caesar could write it in his memoires)

Let's say instead Cotta manages to fight his way back to the camp he abandoned and starts hunkering down with the survivors. Enough cavalrymen of the destroyed legion survived and survived large enough to be a functional albeit leaderless unit. Between these two, they make up 1/8 of the original men and they left the ambush separately. Cotta with some infantry and cavalry survivors back to the fort and some leaderless cavalry going free.

The camp would probably be put under siege to prevent a breakout, but the reduced garrison means the Gauls likely would not need too many men to stop a breakout.

The group of leaderless cavalry rides away from the site of ambush. But instead of riding towards Caesar the free cavalry ride towards the 2nd nearest Roman fort... Quintus's. They see the siege going on and then charge through the siege lines using the element of surprise and end up in the fort. They then report to Quintus what happened.

How would you think Quintus would respond? He just got surrounded by enemies, told one legion was destroyed, then spent days repelling ladder assaults on the fort and watching his messengers who get caught in night escapes executed bloodily the following mornings. Now a few hundred of his friends who survived the ambush (so knew the situation with the first legion since they are that one) and who saw the siege of Quntius's fort (and so know the situation with the siege) just plowed into the fort and are just as trapped as he is.

How would you respond in that situation?

Would this significantly change the course of events of the revolt? OTL was just Caesar tries to relieve Quintus, the Gauls leave the siege to face Caesar, Quintus sends another messanger with where the Gauls went, Caesar wins a pitched battle and he tries to stabilize the situation. Aside from adding a "relieve Cotta" I don't think TTL would be any different.
 
The only possible change I would see is one where Q Tullius is much more grateful to C Julius and this somehow rubs of on M Tullius. However I doubt that there's any non-ASB way to get a Caesarean Cicero after the emergence of the First Triumvirate.
 
The only possible change I would see is one where Q Tullius is much more grateful to C Julius and this somehow rubs of on M Tullius. However I doubt that there's any non-ASB way to get a Caesarean Cicero after the emergence of the First Triumvirate.

At this point, the First Triumvirate is has already emerged. it came with Caesar's first consulship. It ended in 53 BC with the death of Crassus. In 56 BC, Cicero made peace with the Triumvirate which was essentially them pushing for the lifting of his banishment for... something. I'm not sure what they wanted out of him since they were not expecting him to openly support them.

I really don't think it would affect Cesar's civil war (assuming it doesn't get butterflied away, which it probably wouldn't considering I don't even see even the Gallic wars being much that different... Vercingetorix's revolt will happen on schedule as far as I can tell and Caesar will still win and Cesar still wants to transition from his governorship to a consulship) that much either.

In OTL the elder Cicero (M Tullius) at the time of the Civil War wrote that he thought Caesar was a destabilizing force but better personally and more friendly (did he miss the time when he was a consul and Caesar started a ruckus when a vote when against Cesar?). Pompey was closer politically. The most important thing to him was that Caesar and Pompey seemed both peas in a pod for the part he cared about. By 49 BC, both had defied the Senate and seemed to care little for the law when it was inconvenient. He guessed no matter who won the civil war, a military dictatorship for life was probable. Eventually he decided that Pompey had the backing of the 3/4 of the Senate (in exile in Greece), so if Pompey won and was awarded a lifetime dictatorship with nominal support with the Senate, then the Senate would be in good condition to pick things up and hopefully life would go back to normal. When Pompey no longer commanded the support of the Senate after the Battle of Pharalus, Cicero went back to Rome to sit on the sidelines waiting for favorable developments that would not come.

To get M Tullius Cicero to be Caesarean Cicero, the majority of the Senate just needs to stay in Rome after Caesar strolls in. This can be plausible as far as I know. In OTL Caesar in 50 BC bribed a consul, three aediles, and the 2 questers that follow the 2 consuls from the Optimates faction to be his yes-men. The consul's principal campaign promise was to strip Caesar of his legions and then double back after bribes. So bribes or something to turn the Senate to Cesar would make Cicero a reluctant Caesarean.

I don't think that is happen with this POD. Q Tullius is much more grateful to C Julius in TTL, but that won't affect more than one Senator in 49 BC! The most important aspects that Cicero compared Pompey and Caesar with when deciding who to side is not personal feelings of which he favored Cesar anyways, but of Senate support.

I was mostly thinking if anything might change a bit with the Gallic Wars, but good for you for looking ahead.

I don't know much about Quintus's personality. I knew after this incident he wrote a letter to M Cicero saying he almost died and it was scary, but didn't blame Cesar and it's implied in the letter he knows this is a risk legionary officers have to accept. I also knew he worked hard during the siege. Caesar's own notes of this incident could be summed up as "well, just hunkering down and sending a rider wasn't brilliant tactics, but I'm pleasantly surprised he didn't mess up under crisis"



If Quintus had my personality, this might be how the exchange goes after the survivors of the other legion come.
Quintus: Hey, you guys are from the destroyed unit. The Gauls told me they killed all of you!
Cavalry: They have good reason to think so. Some of us went back to camp and were pursued, I don't know if any of them made it. We are the rest. Came with seven days of food on our backs and no friendlies to offer food.
Quintus: So which one of you told Cesar?
Cavalry: What?
Quintus: Your legion got massacred and you saw mine under siege. Some of you tried to break the siege lines and some went to get help right?
Cavalry: I thought you would have called for help? All of us came into the fort to find refuge from an intact legion.
Quintus: Arrggg. *facepalm* We are still trying to send a rider OUT!
Then Quintus weeps at the three riders who got killed trying to escape. Then takes a nap, because I think at this point he went 3 days with 6 hours of sleep. About 12 hours before in OTL his centurions told him he needs sleep.

Huh, I wonder why in OTL it took them so long (over a week) to figure out to send a rider than knew Breton (or whatever the Gaullic Celtic language was) dressed as a Gaul instead of Roman in full uniform who couldn't speak the language.
 
In 56 BC, Cicero made peace with the Triumvirate which was essentially them pushing for the lifting of his banishment for... something. I'm not sure what they wanted out of him since they were not expecting him to openly support them.
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He was exiled by a law that sentenced all those who had put Citizens to death without trial, proposed I believe by P Clodius, to exile. Cicero had had some Catalinarians summarily executed in 60 BCE but claimed that an SCU absolved him from prosecution--vut left when push came to shove
 
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