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=MODERN ARTILLERY IN THE FIELD.= A Description of the Artillery of
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By Colonel H. A. BETHELL, R.F.A. With 14 Plates and 126
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=AN OUTLINE OF THE RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR=, 1904, 1905. By Colonel
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=OUR CAVALRY.= By Major-General M. F. RIMINGTON, C.V.O., C.B. With
8 Diagrams.
_In the Press._
=FROM THE BLACK MOUNTAIN TO WAZIRISTAN.= Being an Account of
the Countries and the Tribes controlled by the N.W. Frontier
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Colonel HAROLD WYLLY, C.B.
MACMILLAN AND CO., LTD., LONDON.
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OUR CAVALRY
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1912
COPYRIGHT
PREFACE
In this book no attempt has been made to produce an exhaustive treatise
on Cavalry; it has been written principally for junior officers of all
arms.
M. F. R.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
Cavalry in past ages--Drawn from horse-lovers, success
followed on fixed principles, these are as applicable
to-day--Ballistics from horseback--Always a sign
and cause of weakening--The charge of good _moral_--
Gunpowder and other improvements notwithstanding--Good
scouts always available--Best lessons are learnt in
war--Expense of cavalry--Duty of cavalry leader Page 1
CHAPTER II
ARMAMENT
Constant changes--Cut _v._ thrust--Gerard’s experience--
Point more deadly--The case for the lance--The
revolver--Confidence in the arm selected is of highest
importance--The rifle--The insistence of continental
writers inapplicable to British cavalry Page 10
CHAPTER III
THE HORSE
Colossal bill for horse-flesh in South Africa largely due
to national ignorance of horses--The suitable horse,
two classes--Chest measurement test for stamina--Small
blood horse stands work best--Arabs bred for war--
English and Australian horses for size--Care of horse in
war--An exception to this Page 18
CHAPTER IV
TACTICS OF CAVALRY _V._ CAVALRY
The squadron attack--Cohesion--And its result in
_moral_--Tactics--Cunning--The rally--Cromwell--
Supports--Conclusions Page 29
CHAPTER V
CAVALRY _V._ CAVALRY
FORMING TO THE FLANK
I. The squadron--Forming to the front or flank--Defensive
or offensive flank. II. The regiment, advantage of
Echelon attack. III. The Brigade--Training of leaders--
Co-operation of R.H.A.--Two forms of attack, when both
forces get away from the guns--Formations for moving to
a flank--Relative effect of artillery fire on the two
formations--Column of masses preferred--Formation for
the attack--Time for horse artillery to unlimber--Form
of attack must be simple--Conclusions Page 37
CHAPTER VI
FIRE ACTION IN TACTICS OF CAVALRY _V._ CAVALRY
Not a question to be shirked--Danger of recourse to fire
action weakening our leaders’ desire for shock action--
An instance of fire _versus_ shock action--Rifle fire
against charging horsemen is ineffectual--Contradictory
memoranda on the subject--Henderson’s dictum--
Dismounted action of cavalry--German regulations--
Prince Kraft Page 50
CHAPTER VII
CAVALRY BRIGADE IN ACTION
First objects in the attack--Concentric shock of fire and
horse--Plan to get a good field of fire by alternate
advance of two squadrons--Desiderata in artillery
position--Broad principles--Utilization of ground--
Deception--Get away from our artillery--An example of
attack--The action of the artillery--_Moral_ necessary
to leader--Unreasoning hasty advance deprecated--If
anticipated by enemy, how we may have to act--Passage
of defiles--Dribbling squadrons into a fight--Cure for
dissemination Page 59
CHAPTER VIII
ACTION OF CAVALRY IN THE GENERAL ENGAGEMENT
Independent cavalry, danger of their detachment at
inopportune times--Cavalry and horse artillery at
LOIGNY-POUPRY--Unsatisfactory direction of cavalry in
1870-71 followed by peace belief in rifle--Fallacy of
tendency to dismounted action shown by South African and
Manchurian Wars--The line our training should take--
Cavalry instructional rides--Value of initiative--
Conclusions--Frederick the Great’s cavalry compared
with our South African cavalry--Pursuit--Neglect of,
a British failing--The parallel pursuit--Its value--
Blücher at Katzbach on cavalry pursuit Page 69
CHAPTER IX
THE DISPOSITION OF CAVALRY IN A CAMPAIGN
FIRST PART
Dependence on forage--Principles on which cavalry is
placed in the front--Want of direction in 1870--
Galliffet’s influence--Service of information separated
from that of security--The Napoleonic traditions
revived--And generally adopted--French view--The
cavalry of exploration--The cavalry of army corps--
The divisional cavalry--Generalissimo’s use of his
independent cavalry--Movement _en bondes_--The
effect of modern rifle--Difficulties in the attack of
protective cavalry and mixed detachments. Page 86
SECOND PART
The modern disposition is theoretical--Tendency to
increase independent cavalry at the expense of
protective, for sake of initial advantages--Difficulty
of weaker cavalry rôle--Von Bernhardi on German
cavalry strength--Improvisation of cavalry--Dilemma--
Cyclists--Difficulty of training for non-professional
cavalry--Danger of amateur cavalry officers--The
ULM Campaign--Effect of first success--Boer tactics
unsuitable to European war Page 93
CHAPTER X
HORSE ARTILLERY AND CAVALRY IN THE GENERAL ENGAGEMENT
Deficiency in peace training--The energy of the attack--
An instance--Plan of the attack--In the defence--Value
of artillery in the retreat Page 101
CHAPTER XI
CO-OPERATION OF HORSE ARTILLERY AND CAVALRY
German tendency in 1870 to deprive cavalry of horse
artillery--Reversed by 1907 regulations--Effect of
modern horse artillery--Probable necessity to allocate
horse artillery--Mukden--Arrangement of artillery
support in attack on infantry--Sir Douglas Haig on the
counter-attack--Principles--Conclusions Page 108
CHAPTER XII
HORSE ARTILLERY FIRE EFFECT COMPARED WITH RIFLE FIRE
Comparative efficacy in bullets--Reasons of Henderson’s
advocacy of mounted infantry--Demand for exceptional
arrangements--An instance of masked fire--Von
Bernhardi’s plan--A suggested alternative Page 117
CHAPTER XIII
IN CONTACT WITH THE ENEMY
Duties of the Commander--A day in the outposts--At
night--The men--The horses--Care of men’s health--
Wet weather--Hints for scouts--_Moral_--Sending
out scouts at night--Sniping by nervous sentries--
Fireflies--Ruses and duplicity--Value of a knowledge of
strategy and tactics--To picket an enemy--Security and
information--Instances of picketing the enemy--Practice
in peace--Difficulty of instruction--Practice preferred
to theory--Honest outpost work--Night work--Regiment’s
practice of outposts Page 122
CHAPTER XIV
SOME DETACHED DUTIES OF CAVALRY
Despatch-riding, value in instruction--An instance of a
scheme--Napoleon’s despatches--Tracking, etc.--Value
of maintaining interest--Boy scouts--Influence of
regimental _moral_ in detached work--Prisoners--Convoy
duty Page 139
CHAPTER XV
RAIDS
Diverse views of the value of Stuart’s raid--Japanese raid
on railway line--Vulnerability of railways--Boer and
British Raids--Country which favours raids--Inopportune
raids, Wheeler’s--Futile raids by De Wet and Botha--
An exception to them--Mischenko’s raid--Rennenkampf’s
reconnaissance--Von Pelet Narbonne--Japanese methods--
Conclusions Page 145
CHAPTER XVI
THE TRAINING OF THE CAVALRY OFFICER
The cavalry candidate--Causes of scarcity--Work now
and thirty years ago--Pay--Duties on joining--
Hunting--The sense of duty--Pretence impossible in a
regiment--The effect of a slack commanding officer--
Counteracted by four or five good officers--Value of
drill--Characteristic faults--The practice of possible
situations in war--Officer without imagination is a bad
trainer--Conclusions Page 154
CHAPTER XVII
TRAINING OF OFFICER (_continued_)
Restless activity--The effect of hardship--Training--
Preparation--Cynicism--Desirability of education
for senior officers--A rearguard device--Study and
discussion--A doctrine--Napoleon’s doctrine--He
honoured bravery--_Bis dot qui cito dat_--The selfish
officer--Comradeship--Conclusions Page 167
CHAPTER XVIII
TRAINING OF A SQUADRON
Frederick the Great’s stern methods--How a good leader
is trained--Description of his squadron at work--
Compared with an indifferent leader--Five points in
training a squadron: (i.) Efficiency for war of man and
horse; (ii.) Avoid samples; (iii.) Use of weapons; (iv.)
Self-reliance; (v.) The offensive spirit--The section
system--Value of individual instruction--Dismounted
work--Holding the balance--Problems as a means of
training in resolution--Napoleon’s genius--The Zulu
system--Conclusions Page 177
CHAPTER XIX
TRAINING OF THE HORSE
Value of a well-trained horse on service--Ill-tempered
horses--The ideal of training--Seydlitz’s leap--
The mameluke--The aids, how arrived at from nature--
Their adaptation to our needs--Progress towards
the campaigning horse--A Boer method--Officers
training horses--The wrong leg leading in a race--
The free-jumping lane--Remount competition--Noisy
instructors--Method of teaching horses to walk quickly--
Duty of squadron leader--His value if he has ability Page 191
CHAPTER XX
TRAINING OF THE MAN
Standard of proficiency--Riding, the old and the new
system--Instruction in care of horse--Most difficult
to teach or check--Result of a bad system--Napoleon’s
cavalry in Russia--The care of horses must be the
result of system--Long rides for recruits as a method
of instruction--Riding to hounds--Care of horse
now more necessary--Shooting--Is good, but fire
discipline is essential--The personal weapon--Method
of instruction--Mental and muscular development--The
handy man--Influence of sports--Swimming--Pioneering--
Cooking--Seaside work for a cavalry brigade--Squadron
competition--Regular soldiers and colonials--The
practical instruction--Theory--Instruction in _moral_--
A Japanese view--Demonstration--Intercourse between
officers and men--Grumbling Page 202
DIAGRAMS
NO. PAGE
I. Defensive and Offensive Flanks 40
II. The Two Forms of Attack 43
III. Column of Regimental Masses compared with Column
of Squadrons 45
IV. The Formation for the Attack 47
V. Squadrons _en bondes_ 60
VI. Cavalry Brigade in Action 64
VII. The Passage of a Defile 67
VIII. Cavalry Attack on Dismounted Men holding a Kopje 104
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
“We study the past to foresee the future.”
In these bustling days of headline-up-to-date newspapers, one shrinks
from reminding one’s readers that Xenophon gave excellent advice to
cavalry trainers and leaders--advice which a cavalryman will recognize
is quite as applicable to-day as it was in those distant ages; since
details with regard to grooming horses on hard stones, exercising
cavalry in rough ground, and so on are by no means out of date.
There is every reason to believe that Alexander, and later Rome and
Carthage at their zenith as military nations, had proportionately as
highly-trained cavalry as is possessed by any nation of to-day. Those
who have fought in rearguards and running fights realize that the
Parthian method of fighting must have required the highest training
and _moral_. The cavalry of the predominant nations were drawn from
those who kept horses for their own sport and amusement, and for the
gratification of their pride, and who felt they were better fighting
men on a horse. The descendants of the horse-lovers of those ages
are with us to-day; they are those who love danger, excitement, and
pace, and who find in the blood-horse an animal which shares their
love for these, and will generously sacrifice its life or limbs in the
co-partnership.
Those who have never felt the sensation of a really good horse bounding
and stretching away under them, and the consequent elation, the wonder
as to “what could stop us?” cannot grasp what a cavalry soldier’s
feelings are in the “Charge.”
Following the centuries which saw the final success of the
ordered phalanx of Rome, time after time the more savage races of
horsemen--Attila with his Hunnish squadrons or Abdur-Rahman with Moslem
hordes--drive all before them, anticipating the flight of peace-loving,
easy-going farmers and traders, living on the country and carrying off
what pleases them.
Then held sway
The good old rule ... the simple plan,
That they should take who have the power,
And they should keep who can.
Ages roll by, the picture changes. The days of Norman chivalry animate
and fire the imagination. The hunter warriors, knights, and squires
lead their troops in battle array, throwing them into the combat at the
decisive moment.
Broken bones incurred whilst unhorsing a friend, or a shrewd
spear-thrust when cleaving to the chine a foe, in single combat, were
adventures by no means to be declined or avoided.
Chivalry or enthusiastic religious zeal qualify the rougher side of
their devotion to arms and horsemanship.
In all ages the horse-lovers, the best-mounted nations, have carried
all before them. _Ceteris paribus_ this is true to-day. Then came the
days of “villainous saltpetre,” and many began to doubt and to number
the days of cavalry; and always after a time there rises the cavalry
leader who, emerging from the dangers of a youth spent in war and
sport, sees that pace, weight, _moral_, and the “àpropos” make up for
all the odds, if only leaders, men, and horses are trained, and their
weight and pace rightly applied.
Next in order come Gustavus Adolphus; Cromwell, our great cavalry
leader, and his Ironsides riding knee to knee, and rallying immediately
after the shock; Frederick the Great, and his captains, Ziethen and
Seydlitz, and their ordered application of masses of cavalry. Then
grand old Blücher,[1] and his antagonists of the Napoleonic era, Murat,
Lasalle, Curély.
Certain fixed principles keep cropping up which appear to have guided
these heroes in their movements and dispositions. They are:--
A. Cohesion in the ranks, or knee-to-knee riding.
B. The moral effect of advancing horsemen.
C. The flank march.
D. The “àpropos” charge ridden well home.
E. Surprise.
F. The immediate rally.
G. The necessity of a reserve.
H. Training of the individual man and horse.
I. Care of the horse’s condition.
The more we are able to read and learn of their views of training,
leading, and applying the shock of cavalry, the more we see how little
which is new can be written on the subject.
The same view may be taken of the fire action of cavalry. The best
cavalry leaders have always recognized its great value, where not
put forward as an alternative to the “àpropos” charge, and when
not substituted by the “weakening” leader for the dangerous but
more decisive shock action--that action in which we must have “no
half measures, no irresolution.”[2] But the very fact that they may
themselves have at some time weakened to the extent of shooting at the
enemy from afar, instead of resolutely going in at the unknown, must
have made these leaders recognize that the “charge” must be kept in the
front as our ideal.
Those who cannot understand the predilection of the most advanced and
thoughtful cavalry soldiers for _l’arme blanche_ should ponder on the
success of the Zulu dynasty. Its founder insisted that his men should
be armed only with the stabbing assegai and would not allow them to
throw their assegais. He knew what shock tactics meant and the _moral_
inspired by their successful adoption.
A study of history shows the advocacy of ballistics from the horse at
a charging enemy to have been periodic during the last 2000 years in
peace time, and also that failure has invariably followed its adoption
in war. It is not now seriously considered by any nation.
Whatever the cost, whatever the method, he who tries first to “handle”
his enemy is the one with whom “_moral_,” that incalculable factor,
will rest. Hear what a great trainer of cavalry, writing probably over
fifty years ago, said:--[3]
It cannot be too often repeated that the main thing is to carry out
the mission _at any price_. If possible this should be done mounted
and with the _arme blanche_, but should that not be feasible, then
we must dismount and force a road with the carbine. I am convinced
that cavalry would not be up to the requirements of to-day if they
were not able under certain circumstances to fight on foot, nor
would it be worth the sacrifice that it costs the state.
But if the croakers were alarmed at a sputtering rifle fire, what will
the faint-hearted of our time say to the new and alarming factor which
has now been introduced. Batteries of horse artillery, firing up to
sixty or more low trajectory shells per minute, must now be reckoned
with. These shells contain 236 bullets, weighing 41 to the pound.
If the de Blochs and other theorists paused and wondered what would
happen to cavalry when magazine rifles were invented, what will be
their attitude now? Let them be reassured. But the words of those who
reassure them must ring true and be purified from the dross of the
first thought, “How can we do this and save our own skins?” Let them be
born of the stern resolve, “At all costs we will kill, capture, or put
to flight our enemies.” We must evolve tactics which will enable us to
use every new factor and to deny them to the foe.[4]
Leave them to judge whether the plan of those tactics will be dashed
off by the pen of the ready-writer as a result of experiences gained
during a Whitsun-week holiday on some suburban training ground, or
whether the soldier who has felt the sharp stress of an enemy’s
victory, the heavy hand of adversity and the rough lessons of retreat,
who has seen the barometer of his men’s fate rise and fall under
cyclonic conditions, will painfully and doubtfully elaborate it.
Cromwell, Frederick, Galliffet, these with bitter experience of
the everyday imperfections of human nature, and a well-weighed
determination to insist on tactics which will override those
weaknesses, did not attempt to avoid or shirk the difficulty of losses.
A cool contempt for the contingencies is the primary qualification in
the search for successful methods in cavalry tactics, as well as in the
encounter itself.
Turning now to the detached duties of cavalry, of security and
information, no less do we see the recurrence of the same ideas. The
Curélys and de Bracks, the Mosbys, the cavalry who, “like a heavy
shower of rain, can get through anywhere,” such come right down to us
from ancient history.
The daring hearts who, trusting in a good horse and a knowledge of
woodcraft, torment the enemy, whether in camp, bivouac, on the march,
or on the line of communication, are a product of all campaigns, ready
to the hand of those who know where to find them, and how to inspire
them aright so as to get the very best out of them. And what will good
men not dare and undergo for a word of praise or encouragement from one
whose soul is in what he says?
Again and again, what is learnt in the hard school of campaigning, and
generally where that campaign has been lost, carries the best lesson.
Has any nation set itself more resolutely to correct the faults of its
cavalry[5] than the French nation after the 1870 war?
Conversely, the nation that wins, learns little or nothing; no lesson
is worse than that of easy success in small wars. Witness the Russian
successes in Central Asia for a series of years, followed by the
_débâcle_ of their cavalry action in the Manchurian War when pitted
against an enemy whose cavalry was scarcely “in being,”[6] and the
erroneous conclusions arrived at in regard to cavalry by those who
only saw the first portion of the operations in South Africa 1899-1902.
Von Moltke is credited with saying: “People say one must learn by
experience; I have always endeavoured to learn by the experience of
others.”
The real lessons learnt from war are extremely difficult to impress on
the taxpayer, who, in modern Great Britain, only reads of them in the
newspaper, and who at best does not wish to pay for one more cavalry
soldier than is absolutely necessary.
The cavalry leader must recognize that the arm is expensive, therefore
it cannot afford to be inactive; it is the hardest arm to replace,
therefore it must be used to the full.
In all ages cavalry[7] have been expensive, and one may well wonder
if the frugal mind of the taxpayer balances them against who can say
what pictures of dead and wounded, indemnity, pillage, lost trade, and
damaged prestige, or whether he looks at one side of the balance-sheet
only, and forgets that from which they may save him.
Ignoring these mundane views, it is still the duty of the cavalry
leader who has patriotism in his soul, to keep his heart young and his
muscles trained, and to leave no stone unturned in peace time in his
preparation, as a sacred duty, for war; just as in war it is his duty
to sacrifice his men, his reputation, his horses, everything, in order
to turn the tide of battle or render the victory decisive.
Let officers of cavalry remember that he who in peace time cannot
sacrifice his pleasures to his duty, will in war find it much harder to
give up his life or aggrandisement, possibly in accordance with an idea
or order with which he does not agree, or in which he sees no sense.
This is the serious side; mercifully there is a lighter side to war,
and it is well known that the hair-breadth escapes of themselves
or others, and the “hard tack” form the most amusing and abiding
recollections of a war to those who have participated in it.
Against ill chances men are ever merry.
Withal no cavalry leader is likely to succeed unless there is something
of the gambler’s spirit in him, the gambler who can coolly and calmly
put down his everything on the cards:--
He either fears his fate too much,
Or his deserts are small,
That dares not put it to the touch,
To gain or lose it all.