War Elephants

Walls Of Hue, Vietnam  Engraving 1880

Riding elephants into battle, and retaining some semblance of control has always been very hard for me to wrap my brain around.  I can understand using them to pull heavy gun's to the front, in preparation of the battle, but to control them when the shooting started must have been just a herculean effort.  We tout individual's as being "great trainers" given their effort's in the circus ring.   Compared to riding dozens and dozens of them into a blinding, smoke filled battle,  even a one foot stand seem's to me to be a very weak accomplishment.  It is really, really hard to grasp and conceive of the skill and knowledge that was required to maintain and control a war elephant with chaos raging all around.