the Week of Proper 28 / Ordinary 33
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Bible Encyclopedias
Artillery
1911 Encyclopedia Britannica
or (the O. Fr. artiller, to equip with engines of war, probably comes from Late Lat. articulum, dim. of ars, art, cf. " engine " from ingenium, or of artus, joint), a term originally applied to all engines for discharging missiles, and in this sense used in English in the early 17th century. In a more restricted sense, artillery has come to mean all firearms not carried and used by hand, and also the personnel and organization by which the power of such weapons is wielded. It is, however, not usual to class machine guns as artillery. The present article deals with the development and contemporary state of the artillery arm in land warfare, in respect of its organization, personnel and special or " formal " employment. For the materiel - the guns, their carriages and their ammunition - see Ordnance and Ammunition. For ballistics, see that heading, and for the work of artillery in combination with the other arms, see Tactics.
Artillery, as distinct from ordnance, is usually classified in accordance with the functions it has to perform. The simplest division is that into mobile and immobile artillery, the former being concerned with the handling of all weapons so mounted as to be capable of more or less easy movement from place to place, the latter with that of weapons which are installed in fixed positions. Mobile artillery is subdivided, again chiefly in respect of its employment, into horse and field batteries, heavy field or position artillery, field howitzers, mountain artillery and siege trains, adapted to every kind of terrain in which field troops may be employed, and work they may have to do. Immobile artillery is used in fixed positions of all kinds, and above all in permanent fortifications; it cannot, therefore, be classified as above, inasmuch as the raison d'être, and consequently the armament of one fort or battery may be totally distinct from that of another. " Fortress," " Garrison " and " Foot " artillery are the usual names for this branch. The dividing line, indeed, in the case of the heavier weapons, varies with circumstances; guns of position may remain on their ground while elaborate fortifications grow up around them, or the deficiencies of a field army in artillery may be made good from the materiel, more frequently still from the personnel, of the fortress artillery. Thus it may happen that mobile artillery becomes immobile and vice versa. But under normal circumstances the principle of classification indicated is maintained in all organized military forces.
Historical Sketch I. Early Artillery. - Mechanical appliances for throwing projectiles were produced early in the history of organized warfare, and " engines invented by cunning men to shoot arrows and great stones " are mentioned in the Old Testament. These were continually improved, and, under the various names of catapulta, balista, onager, trebuchet, &c., were employed throughout the ancient and medieval periods of warfare. The machines finally produced were very powerful, and, even when a propelling agent so strong as gunpowder was discovered and applied, the supersession of the older weapons was not effected suddenly nor without considerable opposition. The date of the first employment of cannon cannot be established with any certainty, but there is good evidence to show that the Germans used guns at the siege of Cividale in Italy (1331). The terms of a commission given (1414) by Henry V. to his magister operationum, ingeniarum, et gunnarum ac aliarum ordinationum, one Nicholas Merbury, show that the organization of artillery establishments was grafted upon that which was already in existence for the service of the old-fashioned machines. Previously to this it is recorded that of some 340 men forming the ordnance establishment of Edward III. in 1344 only 12 were artillerymen and gunners. Two years later, at Crecy, it is said, the English brought guns into the open field for the first time. At the siege of Harfleur (1415) the ordnance establishment included 25 " master gunners " and 50 " servitour gunners." The " gunner " appears to have been the captain of the gun, with general charge of the guns and stores, and the special duty of laying and firing the piece in action.
2. The Beginnings of Field Artillery
It is clear, from such evidence as we possess, that the chief and almost the only use of guns at this time was to batter the walls of fortifications, and it is not until later in the 15th century that their employment in the field became general (see also Cavalry). The introduction of field artillery may be attributed to John Zizka, and it was in his Hussite wars (1419-1424) that the Wagenburg, a term of more general application, but taken here as denoting a cart or vehicle armed with several small guns, came into prominence. This device allowed a relatively high manoeuvring power to be attained, and it is found occasionally in European wars two centuries later, as for instance at Wimpfen in 1622 and Cropredy Bridge in 1644. In an act of attainder passed by the Lancastrian party against the Yorkists (1459), it is stated that the latter were " traiterously ranged in bataill. .. their cartes with gonnes set before their batailles " (Rot. Parl. 38 Henry VI., v. 348). In the London fighting of 1460, small guns were used to clear the streets, heavy ordnance to batter the walls of the Tower. The battle of Lose Coat Field (1469) was decided almost entirely by Edward IV.'s field guns, while at Blackheath (1497) "some cornets of horse, and bandes of foot, and good store of artillery wheeling about " were sent to " put themselves beyond " the rebel camp (Bacon, Henry VII.). The greatest example of artillery work in the 15th century was the siege of Constantinople in 1453, at which the Turks used a large force of artillery, and in particular some monster pieces, some of which survived to engage a British squadron in 1807, when a stone shot weighing some 700 lb cut the mainmast of Admiral (Sir) J. T. Duckworth's flagship in two, and another killed and wounded sixty men. For siege purposes the new weapon was indeed highly effective, and the castles of rebellious barons were easily knocked to pieces by the prince who owned, or succeeded in borrowing, a few pieces of ordnance (cf. Carlyle, Frederick the Great, book iii. chap. i.).
3. The 16th Century
In the Italian wars waged by Charles VIII., Louis XII. and Francis I. of France, artillery played 'a most conspicuous part, both in siege and field warfare. Indeed, cannon did excellent service in the field before hand firearms attained any considerable importance. At Ravenna (1512) and Marignan (ii) field artillery did great execution, and at the latter battle " the French artillery played a new and distinguished part, not only by protecting the centre of the army from the charges of the Swiss phalanxes, and causing them excessive loss, but also by rapidly taking up such positions from time to time. .. as enabled the guns to play upon the flanks of the attacking columns" (Chesney, Observations on Firearms, 1852). In this connexion it must, however, be observed that, when the arquebus and other small arms became really efficient (about 1525), less is heard of this small and handy field artillery, which had hitherto been the only means of breaking up the heavy masses of the hostile pikemen. We have seen that artillery was not ignored in England; but, in view of the splendid and unique efficiency of the archers, there was no great opportunity of developing the new arm. In the time of Henry VIII., the ordnance in' use in the field consisted in the main of heavy culverins and other guns of position, and of lighter field pieces, termed sakers, falcons, &c. It is to be noticed that already the lightest pieces had disappeared, the smallest of the above being a 2-pounder. In the earlier days of field artillery, the artillery train was a miscellaneous congeries of pontoon, supply, baggage and tool wagons, heavy ordnance and light guns in carts. With the development of infantry fire the use of the lastnamed weapons died out, and it is largely due to this fact that " artillery " came to imply cumbrous and immobile guns of position. Little is, therefore, heard of smart manoeuvring, such as that at Marignan, during the latter part of the 16th century. The guns now usually come into action in advance of the troops, but, from their want of mobility, could neither accompany a farther advance nor protect a retreat, and they were generally captured and recaptured with every changing phase of the fight. Great progress was in the meanwhile made in the adaptation of ordnance to the attack and defence of fortresses and, in particular, vertical fire came into vogue. A great Turkish gun, carrying a 600-lb stone shot, was used in the siege of Constantinople, apparently in this way, since Gibbon records that at the range of a mile the shot buried itself a fathom deep in earth, a fact which implies that a high angle of elevation was given. In the celebrated siege of Malta in 1565 artillery played a conspicuous part.
4. The Thirty Years' War. - Such, in its broadest outlines, is the history of artillery work during the first three centuries of its existence. Whilst the material had undergone a very considerable improvement, the organization remained almost unchanged, and the tactical employment of guns had become restricted, owing to their slowness and difficulty of movement on the march and immobility in action. In wars of the type of the War of Dutch Independence and the earlier part of the Thirty Years' War, this heavy artillery naturally remained useful enough, and the Wagenburg had given place to the musketry initiated by the Spaniards at Bicocca and Pavia, which since 1525 had steadily improved and developed. It is not, therefore, until the appearance of a captain whose secret of success was vigour and mobility that the first serious attempt was made to produce field artillery in the proper sense of the word, that is, a gun of good power, and at the same time so mounted as to be capable of rapid movement. The " carte with gonnes " had been, as is the modern machine gun, a mechanical concentration of musketry rather than a piece of artillery. Maurice of Nassau, indeed, helped to develop the field gun, and the French had invented the limber, but Gustavus Adolphus was the first to give artillery its true position on the battlefield. At the first battle of Breitenfeld (1631) Gustavus had twelve heavy and forty-two light guns engaged, as against Tilly's heavy 24-pounders, which were naturally far too cumbrous for field work. At the Lech (1632) Gustavus seems to have obtained a local superiority over his opponent owing to the handiness of his field artillery even more than by its fire-power. At Liitzen (1632) he had sixty guns to Wallenstein's twenty-one. His field pieces were not the' celebrated " leather " guns (which were indeed a mere makeshift used in Gustavus' Polish wars) but iron 4-pounders. These were distributed amongst the infantry units, and thus began the system of " battalion guns " which survived in the armies of Europe long after the conditions requiring it had vanished. The object of thus dispersing the guns was doubtless to ensure in the first place more certain co-operation between the two arms, and in the second to exercise a military supervision over the lighter and more useful field pieces which it was as yet impossible to exercise over the personnel of the heavy artillery.
5. Personnel and Classification
More than 300 years after the first employment of ordnance, the men working the guns and the transport drivers were still civilians. The actual commander of the artillery was indeed, both in Germany and in England, usually a soldier, and Lennart Torstensson, the commander of Gustavus' artillery, became a brilliant and successful general. But the transport and the drivers were still hired, and even the gunners were chiefly concerned for the safety of their pieces, the latter being often the property, not of the king waging war, but of some " master gunner " whose services he had secured,. and the latter's apprentices were usually in entire charge of the material. These civilian " artists," as they were termed, owed no more duty to the prince than any other employes, and even Gustavus, it would appear, made no great improvement in the matter of the reorganization of artillery trains. Soldiers as drivers do not appear until 150 years later, and in the meanwhile companies of " firelocks " and " fusiliers " came into existence, as much to prevent the gunners and drivers from running away as to protect them from the enemy. A further cause of difficulties, in England at any rate, was the age of the " gunners." In the reign of Elizabeth, some of the Tower gunners were over ninety years of age. Complaints as to the inefficiency of these men are frequent in the years preceding the English Civil War. Gustavus, however, has the merit of being the first to make the broad classification of artillery, as mobile or non-mobile, which has since been almost universally in force. In his time the 12-pounder was the heaviest gun classed as mobile, and the " feildpeece " par excellence was the 9-pounder or demiculverin. After the death of Gustavus at Liitzen (1632), his principles came universally into practice, and amongst them were those of the employmentof field artillery.
6. The English Civil War. - Even in the English Civil War (Great Rebellion),in which artillery was hampered by the previous neglect of a century, its field work was not often contemptible,. and on occasion the arm did excellent service. But in the campaigns of this war, fought out by men whose most ardent desire was to decide the quarrel swiftly, the marching and manoeuvring: were unusually rapid. The consequence of this was that the guns were sometimes either late in arriving, as at Edgehill, or absent altogether, as at Preston. The role of guns was further reduced by the fact that there were few fortresses to be reduced, and country houses, however strong, rarely required to be battered by a siege train. The New Model army usually sent for siege guns only when they were needed for particular service. On such occasions, indeed, the heavy ordnance did its work so quickly and effectually that the assault often took place one or two days after the guns had opened fire. Cromwell in his sieges made great use of shells, 12-inch and even larger mortars being employed. The castle of Devizes, which had successfully resisted the Parliamentary battering guns, succumbed at once to vertical fire. It does not, however, appear certain that there was any separation of field from siege ordnance, although the Swedish system was followed in almost all military matters.
7. Artillery Progress, 1660-1740
Cromwell's practice of relegating heavy guns to the rear, except when a serious siege operation was in view, and in very rapid movements leaving even the field pieces far behind, was followed to some extent in the campaigns of the age of Louis XIV. The number of ammunition wagons, and above all of horses, required for each gun was four or five times as great as that required even for a modern quickfirer. In the days of Turenne heavy guns were much employed, as the campaigns of the French were directed as a rule to the methodical conquest of territory and fortified towns. Similarly, Marlborough, working amidst the fortresses of the Netherlands in i 706, had over ioo pieces of artillery (of which 60 were mortars) to a force of some 11,000 men, or about 9 pieces per 1000 men. On the other hand, in his celebrated march to the Danube in 1704, he had but few guns, and the allied armies at Blenheim brought into the field only i piece per boo men. At Oudenarde " from the rapidity of the march.. . the battle was fought with little aid from artillery on either side " (Coxe, Marlborough). There was less need now than ever before for rapid manoeuvres of mobile artillery, since the pike finally disappeared from the scene about 1700, and infantry fire-power had become the decisive factor in battles. In the meantime, artillery was gradually ceasing to be the province of the skilled workman, and assuming its position as an arm of the military service. In the 17th century, when armies were as a rule raised only " for the war," and disbanded at the conclusion of hostilities, there had been no very pressing need for the maintenance in peace of an expensive personnel and material. Gunners therefore remained, as civilians, outside the regular administration of the forces, until the general adoption of the " standing army " principle in the last years of the century (see Army). From this time steps were taken, in all countries, to organize the artillery as a military force. After various attempts had been made, the " Royal Regiment of Artillery " came into existence in England in 1716. It is, however, stated that the English artillery did not " begin to assume a military appearance until the Flanders campaigns " of the War of the Austrian Succession. Even in the War of American Independence a dispute arose as to whether a general officer, whose regimental service had been in the Royal Artillery, was entitled to command troops of all arms, and the artillery drivers were not actually soldiers until 1793 at the earliest. French artillery officers received military rank only in 1732.
8. Artillery in the Wars of Frederick the Great. - By the time of Frederick the Great's first wars, artillery had thus been divided into (a) those guns moving with an army in the field, and (b) those which were either wholly stationary or were called upon only when a siege was expected. The personnel was gradually becoming more efficient and more amenable to discipline; the transport arrangements, however, remained in a backward state. Siege and fortress artillery was now organized and employed in accordance with the system of the " formal attack " as finally developed by Vauban. For details of this, as involving the tactical procedure of artillery in the attack and defence of fortresses, the reader is referred to Fortification And Siegecraft. We are concerned here more especially with the progress of field artillery. The part played by this arm began now to vary according to the circumstances of each action, and the " moral " support of guns was calculated as a factor in the dispositions. In the early Silesian wars, heavy or reserve guns protected the deployment of the army and endeavoured to prepare for the subsequent advance by firing upon the hostile troops; the battalion guns remained close to the infantry, accompanied its movements and assisted in the fire fight. Their support was not without value, and the heavy guns often provoked the enemy into a premature advance, as at Mollvvitz. But the infantry or the cavalry forced the decision. It has been mentioned that with the final disappearance of the pike, about 1700, infantry fire-power ruled the battlefield. Throughout the 18th century, it will be found, when the infantry is equal to its work the guns have only a subordinate part in the fighting of pitched battles. At Kunersdorf (1759) the first dashing charge of the Prussian grenadiers captured 72 guns from the Russian army. Later the total of captured ordnance reached 180, yet the Russians, then almost wholly in flight, were not cut to pieces, for only a few light guns of the Prussian army could get to the front; their heavy pieces, though twelve horses were harnessed to each, never came into action. This example will serve to illustrate the difference between the artillery of 1760 and that of fifty years later. According to Tempelhof, who was present, Kunersdorf was the finest opportunity for field artillery that he had ever seen. Yet the field artillery of the i 8th century was, if anything, more powerful than that of Napoleon's time; it was the want of mobility alone which prevented the Prussians from turning to good account an opportunity fully as favourable as that of the German artillery at Sedan. That Frederick made more use of his guns in the later campaigns of the Seven Years' War is accounted for by the fact that his infantry and cavalry were no longer capable of forcing a decision, and also by changes in the general character of the operations. These were fought in and about broken country and entrenched positions, and the mobility of the other arms sank to that of the artillery. Thus power came to the front again, and the heavier weapons regained their former supremacy. In a bataille rangee in the open field the proportion of guns to men had been, in 1741, 2 per 1000. At Leuthen (1757) heavy fortress guns were brought to the front for a special purpose. At Kunersdorf the proportion was 4 and 5 per 1000 men, with what degree of effectiveness we have seen. In the later campaigns the Austrian artillery, which was, throughout the Seven Years' War, the best in Europe, placed its numerous and powerful ordnance (an " amphitheatre of 400 guns," as Frederick said) in long lines of field works. The combination of guns and obstacles was almost invariably too formidable to offer the slightest chance of a successful assault. It was at this stage that Frederick, in 1759, introduced horse artillery to keep pace with the movements of cavalry, a proof, if proof were needed, of the inability of the field artillery to manoeuvre. The field howitzer, the weapon par excellence for the attack of field works, has never perhaps been more extensively employed than it was by the Prussians at that time. At Burkersdorf (1762) Frederick placed 45 howitzers in one battery. In those days the mobile artillery was always formed in groups or " batteries " of from 10 to 20 pieces. England too was certainly abreast of other countries in the organization of the field artillery arm. About the middle of the 18th century the guns in use consisted of 24pounders, 12-pounders, 6-pounders and 3-pounders. The guns were divided into " brigades " of four, five and six guns respectively, and began to be separated into "heavy" and "light" brigades. Each field gun was drawn by four horses, the two leaders being ridden by artillerymen, and had loo rounds of shot and 30 rounds of grape. The British artillery distinguished itself in the latter part of the Seven Years' War. Foreign critics praised its lightness, its elegance and the good quality of its materials. At Marburg (1760) " the English artillery could not have been better served; it followed the enemy with such vivacity, and maintained its fire so well, that it was impossible for the latter to re-form," says Tempelhof, the Prussian artillery officer who records the lost opportunity of Kunersdorf. The merits and the faults of the artillery had been made clear, and nowhere was the lesson taken to heart more than in France, where General Gribeauval, a French officer who had served in the war with the Austrian artillery, initiated reforms which in the end led to the artillery triumphs of the Napoleonic era. While Frederick had endeavoured to employ, as profitably as possible, the existing heavy equipments, Gribeauval sought improvement in other directions.
9. Gribeauval's Reforms. - At the commencement of the 18th century, French artillery had made but little progress. The carriages and wagons were driven by wagoners on foot, and on the field of battle the guns were dragged about by ropes or remained stationary. Towards the middle of the century some improvements were made. Field guns and carriages were lightened, and the guns separated into brigades. Siege carriages were introduced. From 1765 onwards, however, Gribeauval strove to build up a complete system both of personnel and materiel, creating a distinct materiel for field, siege, garrison and coast artillery. Alive to the vital importance of mobility for field artillery, he dismissed to other branches all pieces of greater calibre than 12-pounders, and reduced the weight of those retained. His reforms were resisted, and for a time successfully; but in 1776 he became first inspector-general of artillery, and was able to put his ideas into force. The field artillery of the new system included 4-pounder regimental guns, and for the reserve 8and 12-pounders, with 6-inch howitzers. For siege and garrison service Gribeauval adopted the 16-pounder and 12-pounder guns, 8-inch howitzer and to-inch mortar, 12-, toand 8-inch mortars being introduced in 1785.
The carriages were constructed on a uniform model and technically improved. The horses were harnessed in pairs, instead of in file as formerly, but the manner in which the teams were driven remained much the same. The prolong (a sort of tow-rope) was introduced, to unite the trail of the gun and the limber in slow retiring movements. Siege carriages differed from those of field artillery only in details. Gribeauval also introduced new carriages for garrison and coast service. The great step made was in a uniform construction being adopted for all materiel, and in making the parts interchangeable so far as possible. In 1765 the personnel of the French artillery was reorganized. The corps or reserve artillery was organized in divisions of eight guns. The battery or division was thus made a unit, with guns, munitions and gunners complete, the horses and drivers being added at a later date. Horse artillery was introduced into the French army in 1791. The last step was made in 1800, when the establishment of a driver corps of soldiers put an end to the old system of horsing by contract.
10. British Artillery, 1793-1815. - Meanwhile the numbers of the English artillery had increased to nearly 4000 men. For some five centuries the word " artillery " in England meant entirely garrison artillery; the field artillery only existed in 0 time of war. When war broke out, a train of artillery was organized, consisting of a certain number of field (or siege) guns, manned by garrison gunners; and when peace was proclaimed the train was disbanded, the materiel being returned into store, and the gunners reverting to some fort or stronghold. In 1793 the British artillery was anything but efficient. Guns were still dispersed among the infantry, mobility had declined again since the Seven Years' War, and the American war had been fought out by the other arms. The drivers were mere carters on foot with long whips, and the whole field equipment was scarcely able to break from a foot-pace. Prior to the Peninsular War, however, the exertions of an able officer, Major Spearman, had done much to bring about improvement. Horse artillery had been introduced in 1793, and the driver corps established in 1 794. Battalion guns were abolished in 1802, and field " brigades of six guns " were formed, horse artillery batteries being styled " troops." Military drivers were introduced, and the horses teamed in pairs. The drivers were mounted on the near horses, the gunners either rode the off horses or were carried on the limbers and wagons. The equipment was lightened, and a new system of manoeuvres introduced. A troop of horse artillery and a field brigade each had five guns and one howitzer. The " driver corps," raised in 1794, was divided into troops, the addition of one of which to a company of foot artillery converted it into a field brigade. The horse artillery possessed both drivers and horses, and required very limited assistance from the driver corps.
1 1. French Revolutionary Wars. - During the long wars of the French Revolution and Empire the artillery of the field army by degrees became field artillery as we know it to-day. The development of musketry in the 16th century had taken the work of preparing an assault out of the hands of the gunners. Per contra, the decadence of infantry fire-power in the latter part of the Seven Years' War had reinstated the artillery arm. A similar decadence of the infantry arm was destined to produce, in 1807, artillery predominance, but this time with an important difference, viz. mobility, and when mobility is thus achieved we have the first modern field artillery. The new tactics of the French in the Revolutionary wars, forced upon them by circumstances, involved an almost complete abandonment of the fire-tactics of Frederick's day, and the need for artillery was, from the first fight at Valmy onwards, so obvious that its moral support was demanded even in the outpost line of the new French armies. St Cyr (Armies of the Rhine, p. 112) quotes a case in which " right in the very farthest outpost line " the original 4-pounder guns were replaced by 8-, 16-, and in the end by 24-pounders. The cardinal principle of massing batteries was not, indeed, forgotten, notwithstanding the weakness of raw levies. But though, as we have seen, the materiel had already been greatly improved, and the artillery was less affected by the Revolution than other arms of the service, circumstances were against it, and we rarely find examples of artillery work in the Revolutionary wars which show any great improvement upon older methods. The field guns were however, at last organized in batteries each complete in itself, as mentioned above. The battalion gun disappeared; it was a relic of days in which it was thought advisable, both for other reasons and also because the short range of guns forbade any attempt at concentration of fire from several positions at one target, to have some force of artillery at any point that might be threatened. Though it was officially retained in the regulations of the French army, " officers and men combined to reject it " (Rouquerol, Q. F. Field Artillery, p. 121), and its last appearances, in 1809 and in 1813, were due merely to an endeavour on the part of Napoleon to give cohesion thereby to the battalions of raw soldiers which then constituted his army. But, with the development of mobility, it was probably found that sufficient guns could be taken to any threatened point, and no one had ever denied the principle of massed batteries, although, in practice, dispersion had been thought to be unavoidable.
