13. Artillery, 1815–1865.—Henceforward, therefore, the history of artillery becomes the history of its technical effectiveness, particularly in relation to infantry fire, and of improvements or modifications in the method of putting well-recognized principles into action. Infantry fire, however, being more variable in its effectiveness than that of artillery, the period 1815–1870 saw many changes in the relations of the two arms. In the time of Napoleon, infantry fire never equalled that of the Seven Years’ War, and after the period of the great wars the musket was less and less effectively used. Economy was, however, practised to excess in every army of Europe during the period 1815–1850, and even if there had been great battles at this time, the artillery, which was maintained on a minimum strength of guns, men and horses, would not have repeated the exploits of Sénarmont and Drouot in the Napoleonic wars. The principle was well understood, but under such conditions the practice was impossible. It was at this stage that the general introduction of the rifled musket put an end, once for all, to the artillery tactics of the smooth-bore days. Infantry, armed with a far-ranging rifle, as in the American Civil War, kept the guns beyond case-shot range, compelling them to use only round shot or common shell. In that war, therefore, attacking infantry met, on reaching close quarters, not regiments already broken by a feu d’enfer, but the full force of the defenders’ artillery and infantry, both arms fresh and unshaken, and the full volume of their case shot and musketry. At Fredericksburg the Federal infantry attacked, unsupported by a single field piece; at Gettysburg the Federal artillery general Hunt was able to reserve his ammunition to meet Lee’s assault, although the infantry of his own side was meanwhile subjected to the fire of 137 Confederate guns. Thus, in both these cases the assault became one of infantry against unshaken infantry and artillery. On many occasions, indeed, the batteries on either side went into close ranges, as the traditions of the old United States army dictated, but their losses were then totally out of proportion to their effectiveness. Indeed, the increased range at which battles were now fought, and the ineffectiveness of the projectiles necessarily used by the artillery at these ranges, so far neutralized even rifled guns that artillery generals could speak of “idle cannonades” as the “besetting sin” of some commanders.
14. The Franco-German War, 1870–71.—In the next great war, that of 1866 (Bohemia), guns were present on both sides in great numbers, the average for both sides being three guns per 1000 men. Artillery, however, played but a small part in the Prussian attacks, this being due to the inadequate training then afforded, and also to the mixture of rifled guns and smooth-bores in their armament. In Prussia, however, the exertions of General v. Hindersin, the improvement of the matériel, and above all the better tactical training of the batteries, were rewarded four years later by success on the battlefield almost as decisive as Napoleon’s. In 1870 the French artillery was invariably defeated by that of the Germans, who were then free to turn their attention to the hostile infantry. At first, indeed, the German infantry was too impatient to wait until the victorious artillery had prepared the way for them by disintegrating the opposing line of riflemen. Thus the attack of the Prussian Guards at St Privat (August 18, 1870) melted away before the unbroken fire-power of the French, as had that of the Federals at Fredericksburg and that of the Confederates at Gettysburg. But such experiences taught the German infantry commanders the necessity of patience, and at Sedan the French army was enveloped by the fire of nearly 600 guns, which did their work so thoroughly that the Germans annihilated the Imperial army at the cost of only 5% of casualties.
15. Results of the War.—The tactical lessons of the war, so far as field artillery is concerned, may be briefly summarized as (a) employment of great masses of guns; (b) forward position of guns in the order of march, in order to bring them into action as quickly as possible; (c) the so-called “artillery duel,” in which the assailant subdues the enemy’s artillery fire; and (d) when this is achieved, and not before, the thorough preparation of all infantry attacks by artillery bombardment. This theory of field artillery action has not, even with the almost revolutionary improvements of the present period, entirely lost its value, and it may be studied in detail in the well-known work of von Schell, Taktik der Feldartillerie (1877), later translated into English by Major-General Sir A.E. Turner (Tactics of Field Artillery, 1900). In one important matter, however, the precepts of Schell and his contemporaries no longer hold good. “It is absolutely necessary that the object of the infantry’s attack should be cannonaded before it advances. To accomplish this, sufficient time should be given to the artillery, and on no account should the infantry be ordered to advance until the fire of the guns has produced the desired effect.” This, the direct outcome of the slaughter at St Privat, represents the best possibilities of breechloading guns with common shell—no more than a slow disintegration of the enemy’s power of resistance by a thorough and lengthy “artillery preparation.” Against troops sheltered behind works (as in the Russo-Turkish War of 1877–78) the common shell usually failed to give satisfactory results, if for no other reason, because the “preparation” consumed an inordinate time, and in any case the hostile artillery had first of all to be subdued in the artillery duel.
16. Quick-firing Field Guns.—In 1891, a work by General Wille of the German army (The Field Gun of the Future) and in 1892 another by Colonel Langlois of the French service (Field Artillery with the other Arms) foreshadowed many revolutionary changes in matériel and tactics which have now taken place. The new ideas spread rapidly, and the quick-firing gun came by degrees to be used in every army. The original designs have been greatly improved upon (see Ordnance: Field artillery equipments), but the principles of these designs have not undergone serious modification. These are, briefly, the mechanical absorption of the recoil, by means of brakes or buffers, and the development of “time shrapnel” as the projectile of field artillery. The absorption of recoil of itself permits of a higher rate of fire, since the gun does not require to be run up and relaid after every shot. Formerly such an advantage was illusory (since aim could not be taken through the thick bank of smoke produced by rapid fire), but the introduction of smokeless powder removed this objection. Artillerists, no longer handicapped, at once turned their attention to the increase of the rate of fire. At the same time a shield was applied to the gun, for the protection of the detachment. This advantage is solely the result of the non-recoiling carriage. The gunners had formerly to stand clear of the recoiling gun, and a shield was therefore of but slight value.
17. Time Shrapnel.—The power of modern artillery owes even more to the improvement of the projectile than to that of the gun (see Ammunition). The French, always in the forefront of artillery progress, were the first nation to realize the new significance of the time-fuze and the shrapnel shell. These had been in existence for many years; to the British army are due both the invention and the development of the shrapnel, which made its first appearance in European warfare at Vimeira in 1808. But, up to the introduction of rifled pieces, the Napoleonic case-shot attack was universally and justly considered the best method of fighting, and in the transition stage of the matériel many soldiers continued to put faith in the old method,—hence the Prussian artillery in 1866 had many smooth-bore batteries in the field,—and between 1860 and 1870 gunners, now convinced of the superiority of the new equipments, undoubtedly sought to turn to account the minute accuracy of the rifled weapons in unnecessarily fine shooting. Thus, in 1870 the French time-fuze was only graduated for two ranges, and the Germans used percussion fuzes only. But this phase has passed, and General Langlois has summarized the tactics of the newest field artillery in one phrase: “It results in transferring to 3000 yds. the point-blank and case-shot fire of the smooth-bore.” The meaning of this will be discussed later; here it will be sufficient to say that it is claimed for the modern gun and the modern shell that the Napoleonic method[1] of annihilating by a rain of bullets has been revived, with the distinction that the shell, and not the gun, fires the bullets close up to the enemy. In the Boer War, Pieter’s Hill furnished a notable example of this “covering,” as distinct from “preparation,” of an assault by artillery fire.
18. Heavy Field, Siege and Garrison Artillery.—Amongst other results of this war was a recrudescence of the idea of “dispersion.” This will be noticed later; the more material result of the Boer War, and of the generally increasing specialization in the various functions of the artillery arm, has been the reintroduction of heavy ordnance into field armies. The field howitzer reappeared some time before the outbreak of that war, and the British howitzers had illustrated their shell-power in the Sudan campaign of 1898. During the latter part of the 19th century, siege and fortress artillery underwent a development hardly less remarkable than that of field artillery in the same time. Rifled guns, “long” and “short” for direct and curved fire, formed the siege artillery of the Germans in 1870–71, and
- ↑ Napoleon’s maxim, quoted above, reappears in spirit in the British F. A. Training of 1906 (p. 225).
