What happened is well documented, and is an unfortunate blot on the honor, not just of Caesar but the whole army. I can only imagine the glee with which Ambiorix heard about the acceptance of his terms, while I also think there might have been some disbelief that his trap was entered so easily. Now all that remained was for it to be sprung, and it was, in the form of an ambush in the first wooded area into which the Legion marched. About two miles from the camp, just as the Legion descended into a ravine, the jaws of the trap snapped shut in the form of a very large force that appeared not only on both flanks, but at the rear of the formation once the baggage train entered. From what was extracted under torture from Eburones there at the time, apparently the only senior officer that acquitted himself with any honor was Cotta, who had apparently resigned himself to this happening. Titurius, by every prisoner's account, yielded to panic, running every which way trying to put Cohorts into position, all to no avail. Finally, Sabinus ordered the abandonment of the baggage train and the Legion formed into the orbis¸ as sure a signal to a ranker that all is essentially lost as waving a white flag. For some men, this gives them the courage of the damned, and they fight like heroes of Troy; for other men, they meekly await what they believe to be the inevitable in their death. Such resignation can infect a Legion quickly, and I am as sure as an old soldier can be that this was part of the problem. Enough of the men of the 14th reacted in the former manner to not only impose a high cost on the enemy, but to force the Eburones to adopt a new tactic. Ambiorix ordered his men to move a safe distance away before continuing the assault by missiles, using both javelins and slings. It was in this manner that the second phase of the battle, if such can be called began, with men continuing to fall. Making things even more difficult were some of the greedier Legionaries dashing from the formation to run to the baggage train in an attempt to retrieve their valuables, only to be inevitably cut down. Finally, Titurius spotted Ambiorix in the formation and asked for a parley, which was granted. Ambiorix proceeded to tell him that he had no objections, but the Romans would have to approach where Ambiorix was standing, instead of meeting halfway as was normal. Titurius went to ask Cotta if he wanted to go along to parley with Ambiorix, yet Cotta, despite already being wounded, resolutely refused to place himself at the mercy of Ambiorix. He was the smart one; Titurius convinced Sabinus, and most shamefully to those of us in the ranks, some of the senior Centurions to go along with him. When they approached Ambiorix, they were ordered to drop their weapons, which they did, whereupon Ambiorix had them slaughtered where they stood. Now without many of the senior leaders, the Legion was doomed, and I have little doubt that they knew it.
Despite their desperate situation, the remaining Centurions ordered a fighting withdrawal back to the camp, which they performed, battling every step of the way. I can only imagine the agony of those two miles, yet somehow, a small number of men, perhaps 300 in all, made it back to the walls of the camp. The aquilifer of the 14th Legion, a man named Lucius Petrosidius was trapped against the wall of the camp, unable to break free of the press of the Eburones, who knew how highly we value the symbol of our Legion and were as equally determined to take it as he was to keep it. Even with him putting up a ferocious fight, he clearly saw that he was doomed, so rather than let the eagle fall into the hands of the enemy, he threw it over the wall before being cut down. The remainder of the men managed to make it into the camp, yet despite the temporary respite, they knew that their overall situation was hopeless. That night, rather than fall into enemy hands, they made a pact, killing themselves to a man. Some men, perhaps 50 all told, made a break for the woods beyond the camp rather than entering it, at least that was their story when they finally made their way to our camp some 50 miles away. I do not doubt that many of these men were truthful, that they fought their way out of the ambush back to the camp, whereupon they decided to throw the dice, betting on the uncertain safety of the forest, but which also provided the only chance of living past the next few watches. Their wounds, the condition of their clothing and most importantly, the look in their eyes told us that they were speaking the truth. There were others, however, whose condition was suspiciously good for what they had supposedly been through, and these men were treated with suspicion and hostility. Every Legion, no matter how stalwart, has its share of men who are the first to break and run when things get dangerous, even though it is a risky thing to do, since the punishment for such behavior is death by beating from your comrades. But in our army, where even the newer Legions had served for a couple of years, the most obviously cowardly of the lot had long since disappeared, one way or another. Those men left who were of a similar mind were much more cunning, having learned how to disguise their flight as something other than cowardice. Even in my own tent section, we had a man who was of such a nature, but as much as I hate to be fair to Didius, he was not a complete coward. Whatever the cause, these men who escaped brought us tidings of the greatest disaster to befall our army, and Caesar, since we were in Gaul.
This disaster was just the beginning of the troubles. Ambiorix, flushed with success, headed into the territory of the Aduatuci, persuading them to join his cause. Following that, he moved into the lands of the Nervii, our old enemies, who we had been told were slaughtered at the river that day. Despite the fact that they were greatly diminished in numbers, they were not the 500 warriors that the old men claimed; it was during this time we learned definitively that more than 7,000 had escaped into the woods. They needed little prodding to throw their lot in with Ambiorix and the Eburones, and it was to the younger Cicero’s camp that they headed next. Ambiorix had set out almost immediately after the bodies of the remaining men in the camp of the 14th that slew themselves were discovered, with he and a group of horsemen riding hard to reach first the Aduatuci, then the Nervii. Because of the speed of his advance, word of the disaster had not yet reached Cicero’s camp; piecing things together later, we calculated that the first of the survivors of the massacre were just arriving at our camp when the combined host of Gauls swooped down onto Cicero and the 7th. They first surprised a group of men out on woodcutting detail, slaughtering a full Century to a man, before surrounding the camp and beginning the assault. It was only the courage and steadfastness of the men of the 7th that kept the enemy at bay that first day, and from all accounts, it was a close-run, desperate thing, yet when night fell our boys still held the camp. Cicero possessed the presence of mind to send not just one but several messengers to Caesar telling him of his predicament, although he and his men held little hope that they would be able to hold out long enough for relief, even if any of the messengers got through to Caesar. During that first night, all the men of the 7th, even those on the sick list because of a bloody flux that was sweeping through the camp, along with men wounded in that first day, pitched in to strengthen their defenses and repair the damage to the camp suffered during the first assault.