14. 720 Polish Troops Stopped 40,000 Attacking Germans for Three Days
The Battle of Winza took place between September 7 and 10 of 1939 in which a force of around 40,000 German troops descended on a defensive Polish encampment. Reports vary the actual Polish count from 350 to 720 in total. Called the Polish Thermopylae (named after the battle made famous by the movie 300), the biggest shock was probably on the commanding officers faces in Germany when they realized that it took them more than 72 hours to get through such a small number of troops. The Poles lost in the end, but not before slowing the advance of the Germans, helping prevent some operations from coming to fruition on time.