noun
definition
A blow given in return.
definition
A retaliation.
Examples of counterstroke in a Sentence
The advantage of position being thus lost, the Spanish infantry rose and flung itself on the attackers; the landsknechts and the French bands were disordered by the fury of the counterstroke, being unaccustomed to deal with the swift, leaping, and crouching attack of swordsmen with bucklers.
As a counterstroke, however, Conrad of Hohenstaufen, the brother of Frederick, was chosen German king in December 1127, and was quickly recognized in northern Italy.
She had exhausted every art of diplomatic obstruction to the aggressive action of France; her counterstroke to the unexpectedly easy victory of the French arms was the formal recognition of the revolted colonies as independent states.
The Prussians had seized the opportunity offered by the slackening of the French attacks to rally and deliver a counterstroke, which was parried, after achieving a small measure of success, by the bayonets of the Young Guard.
Blucher now delivered a general counterstroke against Vandamme.
Nevertheless he had every intention of delivering a heavy and decisive counterstroke when the right moment should come, and meantime his defensive tactics would certainly have full play on this prearranged battlefield with its elaborate redoubts, bombproofs and obstacles, and its garrison of a strength obviously equal (and in reality superior) to that of the assailants.
It was not into this gap, which had no military significance, but upon the isolated divisions of the 1st Army that the Russian general proposed to launch his counterstroke.
But the right of the 1st Army (12th division) was threatened by the gathering storm of the counterstroke from the side of Yentai Mines, and had it not been that the resolute Okasaki continued the attack on Manjuyama alone, the Japanese offensive would have come to a standstill.
The fugitives of Orlov's command disordered the on-coming corps of Stakelberg, and the outer flank of the great counterstroke that was to have rolled up Kuroki's thin line came to an entire standstill.
Nogi's first attack (1st2nd March) had not much success, and a heavy counterstroke was delivered on the 2nd.
He had organized another counterstroke for the 6th, to be led by Kaulbars, but this collapsed unexpectedly after a brief but severe fight.
But this last great counterstroke of the Confederacy alarmed the whole North.
Lee 's other divisions under Magruder, Huger and Holmes were to defend the lines which covered Richmond from the east, and so prevent McClellan effecting a counterstroke.
Enghien hurriedly re-formed his troops, fearing at every moment to be hurled down the hill by a counterstroke; but none came.
Enghien had designed his battle even more carefully than before, but as the result of a series of accidents the two French armies attacked prematurely and straight to their front, one brigade after another, and though at one moment Enghien, sword in hand, broke the line of defence with his last intact reserve, a brilliant counterstroke, led by Mercy's brother Kaspar (who was killed), drove out the assailants.
To a heavy counterstroke against Oudinot, which completely drove that marshal from the ground won on the 20th, the emperor paid no more heed than to order Macdonald to support the XII corps.
Hence came the marvellous success of the Yorkist counterstroke in June 1460, when the exiled Warwick, landing in Kent with a mere handful of men, was suddenly joined by the whole of the south of England and the citizens of London, and inflicted a crushing defeat on defeatsth.
Seeing then that the troops before him could hold their own, Ladmirault continued his preparations for his counterstroke, and Cissey's division had begun to move into its prescribed alignment, facing towards Vionville, when the sudden apparition of a closed mass of Prussian troops detaching itself from the low dust-cloud of a slow-moving infantry column, and forming to the south of Mars-la-Tour, again arrested his attention.