History’s biggest Badasses
William Marshall
William Marshal (c.1147–1219) was an English knight and statesman who served four kings and became the most celebrated tournament fighter and battlefield commander of the High Middle Ages. Renowned for his unwavering loyalty and mastery of mounted combat, he helped preserve the English crown during civil war and was later mythologized as the living ideal of chivalry.
Rank - 137
Harold G. “Hal” Moore
U.S. Army officer whose calm, uncompromising leadership at the Battle of Ia Drang defined modern airmobile warfare and the brutal reality of command under fire.
Rank - 139
Smedley D. Butler
Smedley D. Butler was a two-time Medal of Honor–winning U.S. Marine who spent decades fighting America’s overseas wars during the age of imperial expansion. After retiring, he became one of the nation’s fiercest critics of war profiteering, condemning the very system that had made him famous.
Rank - 148
John III Sobieski
John III Sobieski was the Polish king who thundered downhill at Vienna and changed Europe’s fate in a single charge.
Rank - 152
Haji Murad
Mountain warlord, double-crossing survivor, and nightmare of the Russian Empire. He fought for faith, power, and family in that order—then died doing all three at once, proving the Caucasus never belonged to anyone who wanted it neatly.
Rank - 153
Leonidas I
Leonidas I, the third son who was never meant to be king, died in a narrow pass at Thermopylae turning a doomed delay into a legend sharp enough to outlive the empire that killed him.
Rank - 169
Adrian Carton de Wiart
A walking catalogue of injuries, Adrian Carton de Wiart charged through the twentieth century’s worst battles with the attitude of a man personally offended by mortality.
Rank - 175
Otto Skorzeny
Otto Skorzeny (1908–1975) was an Austrian SS commando famed for his audacious World War II special operations.
Rank - 179
Ariel Sharon
Ariel Sharon’s life reads like a battlefield map—bold advances, scorched retreats, and a legacy carved in dust, defiance, and the fine print of history’s moral gray zone.
Rank - 187
Maurice De Saxe
Bloated, brilliant, and half-dying, Maurice de Saxe turned Fontenoy into a masterpiece of smoke, steel, and spite—the last waltz of France’s hungover genius.
Rank - 188