THE RISE OF RAIL-POWER
IN WAR AND CONQUEST
1833-1914
THE
RISE OF RAIL-POWER
IN WAR AND CONQUEST
1833-1914
WITH A BIBLIOGRAPHY
BY
EDWIN A. PRATT
Author of "A History of Inland Transport,"
"Railways and their Rates," etc.
LONDON
P. S. KING & SON, LTD.
ORCHARD HOUSE
WESTMINSTER
1915
CONTENTS.
CHAP. PAGE
I A NEW FACTOR 1
II RAILWAYS IN THE CIVIL WAR 14
III RAILWAY DESTRUCTION IN WAR 26
IV CONTROL OF RAILWAYS IN WAR 40
V PROTECTION OF RAILWAYS IN WAR 54
VI TROOPS AND SUPPLIES 62
VII ARMOURED TRAINS 67
VIII RAILWAY AMBULANCE TRANSPORT 81
IX PREPARATION IN PEACE FOR WAR 98
X ORGANISATION IN GERMANY 103
XI RAILWAY TROOPS IN GERMANY 122
XII FRANCE AND THE WAR OF 1870-71 138
XIII ORGANISATION IN FRANCE 149
XIV ORGANISATION IN ENGLAND 175
XV MILITARY RAILWAYS 205
XVI RAILWAYS IN THE BOER WAR 232
XVII THE RUSSO-JAPANESE WAR 260
XVIII STRATEGICAL RAILWAYS: GERMANY 277
XIX A GERMAN-AFRICAN EMPIRE 296
XX DESIGNS ON ASIATIC TURKEY 331
XXI SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS 345
APPENDIX
INDIAN FRONTIER RAILWAYS 357
THE DEFENCE OF AUSTRALIA 368
BIBLIOGRAPHY 376
INDEX 398
PREFATORY NOTE.
The extent to which railways are being used in the present War of the
Nations has taken quite by surprise a world whose military historians,
in their accounts of what armies have done or have failed to do on the
battle-field in the past, have too often disregarded such matters of
detail as to how the armies got there and the possible effect of good or
defective transport conditions, including the maintenance of supplies
and communications, on the whole course of a campaign.
In the gigantic struggle now proceeding, these matters of detail are
found to be of transcendant importance. The part which railways are
playing in the struggle has, indeed--in keeping with the magnitude of
the struggle itself--assumed proportions unexampled in history. Whilst
this is so it is, nevertheless, a remarkable fact that although much has
been said as to the conditions of military unpreparedness in which the
outbreak of hostilities in August, 1914, found the Allies, there has, so
far as I am aware, been no suggestion of any inability on the part of
the railways to meet, at once, from the very moment war was declared,
all the requirements of military transport. In this respect, indeed, the
organisation, the preparedness, and the efficiency throughout alike of
the British and of the French railways have been fully equal to those of
the German railways themselves.
As regards British conditions, especially, much interest attaches to
some remarks made by Sir Charles Owens, formerly General Manager of
the London and South Western Railway Company, in the course of an
address delivered by him to students of the London School of Economics
on October 12, 1914. He told how, some five or six years ago, he had
met at a social function the Secretary of State for War, who, after
dinner, took him aside and asked, "Do you think in any emergency which
might arise in this country the railways would be able to cope with it
adequately?" To this question Sir Charles replied, "I will stake my
reputation as a railway man that the country could not concentrate men
and materials half so fast as the railways could deal with them; but the
management of the railways must be left in the hands of railway men."
We have here an affirmation and a proviso. That the affirmation was
warranted has been abundantly proved by what the British railways have
accomplished in the emergency that has arisen. The special significance
of the proviso will be understood in the light of what I record in the
present work concerning the control of railways in war.
Taking the railways of all the countries, whether friends or foes,
concerned in the present World-War, and assuming, for the sake of
argument, that all, without exception, have accomplished marvels in the
way of military transport, one must, nevertheless, bear in mind two
important considerations:--
(1) That, apart from the huge proportions of the scale upon which,
in the aggregate, the railways are being required to serve military
purposes, the present conflict, in spite of its magnitude, has thus far
produced no absolutely new factor in the employment of railways for war
except as regards the use of air-craft for their destruction.
(2) That when hostilities were declared in August, 1914, the subject
of the employment of railways for the purposes of war had already been
under the consideration of railway and military experts in different
countries for no fewer than eighty years, during which period, and
as the result of vast study, much experience, and many blunders in
or between wars in various parts of the world, there had been slowly
evolved certain fixed principles and, also, subject to constant
amendments, a recognised and comprehensive organisation which, accepted
more or less completely by the leading nations, with modifications to
suit their national circumstances and conditions, was designed to meet
all contingencies, to provide, as far as human foresight could suggest,
for all possible difficulties, and be capable of application instantly
the need for it might arise.
The time has not yet come for telling all that the railways have thus
far done during the war which has still to be fought out. That story, in
the words of a railway man concerned therein, is at present "a sealed
book." Meanwhile, however, it is desirable that the position as defined
in the second of the two considerations given above should be fully
realised, in order that what the railways and, so far as they have
been aided by them, the combatants, have accomplished or are likely to
accomplish may be better understood when the sealed book becomes an open
one.
If, as suggested at the outset, the world has already been taken by
surprise even by what the railways are known to have done, it may be
still more surprised to learn (as the present work will show) that
the construction of railways for strategical purposes was advocated
in Germany as early as 1833; that in 1842 a scheme was elaborated for
covering Germany with a network of strategical railways which, while
serving the entire country, would more especially allow of war being
conducted on two fronts--France and Russia--at the same time; and that
in the same year (1842) attention was already being called in the French
Chamber to the "aggressive lines" which Germany was building in the
direction of France, while predictions were also being made that any new
invasion of France by Germany would be between Metz and Strasburg.
If, again, it is found that a good deal of space is devoted in the
present work to the War of Secession, criticism may, perhaps, be
disarmed by the explanation that the American Civil War was practically
the beginning of things as regards the scientific use of railways for
war, and that many of the problems connected therewith were either
started in the United States or were actually worked out there,
precedents being established and examples being set which the rest of
the world had simply to follow, adapt or perfect. The possibility of
carrying on warfare at a great distance from the base of supplies by
means of even a single line of single-track railway; the creation of
an organised corps for the restoration, operation or destruction of
railways; the control of railways in war by the railway or the military
interests independently or jointly; the question as to when the railway
could be used to advantage and when it would be better for the troops
to march; the use of armoured trains; the evolution of the ambulance or
the hospital train--all these, and many other matters besides, are to
be traced back to the American Civil War of 1861-65, and are dealt with
herein at what, it is hoped, will be found not undue length.
As for the building up of the subsequent organisation in
Europe--Germany, France and England being the countries selected
for special treatment in relation thereto--this, also, has had to
be described with some regard for detail; and, incidentally, it is
shown (1) that the alleged perfection of Germany's arrangements when
she went to war with France in 1870-71 is merely one of the fictions
of history, so far as her military rail-transport was concerned; (2)
that France learned the bitter lesson taught her by the deplorable and
undeniable imperfections of her own transport system--or no-system--on
that occasion, and at once set about the creation of what was to become
an organisation of the most complete and comprehensive character; and
(3) that the "beginning of things" in England, in the way of employing
railways for the purposes of war, was the direct outcome of the
conditions of semi-panic created here in 1859 by what was regarded as
the prospect of an early invasion of this country by France, coupled
with the then recognised deficiencies of our means of national defence.
Military railways, as employed in the Crimean War, the Abyssinian
Campaign, the Franco-German War, the Russo-Turkish War and the Sudan
are described; a detailed account is given of the use of railways in
the Boer War and the Russo-Japanese War; and this is followed by a
description of the strategical railways constructed in Germany for the
purpose of facilitating war on the possessions of her neighbours.
Chapters XIX and XX deal with the building of railways which,
whether avowedly strategical or what I have described as
"economic-political-strategical," are intended to effect the purposes
of conquest, with or without the accompaniment of war. The former of
these two chapters, which shows how, with the help of railways, Germany
proposed to transform the African continent into an African Empire of
her own, should be found deserving of notice, and especially so in view
of the statements quoted (p. 311) as having been made by German officers
in what was then German South-West Africa, to the effect that the main
objective of Germany in going to war would be the conquest of Africa,
"the smashing up of France and Great Britain" being regarded only as
"incidents" which, followed by seizure of the possessions of the smaller
Powers, would make Germany the supreme Power in Africa, and lead to the
whole African continent becoming a German possession.
From Chapter XX the reader will learn how Germany proposed to employ
railways for the furthering of her aims against, not only Asiatic
Turkey, but Egypt and India, as well.
The subsidiary articles on "Indian Frontier Railways" and "The Defence
of Australia" have no direct bearing on that _evolution_ of rail-power
in warfare with which it is the special purpose of the present volume
to deal; but in the belief that they are of interest and importance in
themselves, from the point of view of the general question, they have
been given in an Appendix. The difficulties and other conditions under
which the Sind-Pishin State Railway, designed to serve strategical
purposes, was built to the frontiers of Afghanistan are unexampled in
the history either of railways or of war. As regards Australia, the
gravity of the position there was well indicated by Lord Kitchener when
he wrote of the lines running inland that they were "of little use for
defence, although possibly of considerable value to an enemy who would
have temporary command of the sea."
At the end of the volume there is a Bibliography of books, pamphlets
and review or other articles relating to the use of railways for the
purposes of war. In the first instance this compilation was based on
a "List of References" prepared by the American Bureau of Railway
Economics; but, while many items on that list have here been omitted, a
considerable number of others have been inserted from other sources. The
Bibliography is not offered as being in any way complete, but it may,
nevertheless, be of advantage to students desirous of making further
researches into the matters of history here specially treated.
The assistance rendered in other ways by the American Bureau of Railway
Economics in the preparation of the present work has been most helpful.
In the writing of the chapters concerning German designs on Africa, Asia
Minor, etc., the resources of the well-arranged and admirably-indexed
library of the Royal Colonial Institute have been of great service. I
have, also, to express cordial acknowledgments to the General Managers
and other officers of various leading railway companies for information
given respecting the organisation of railways in this country for
military purposes.
EDWIN A. PRATT.
_November, 1915._
The Rise of Rail-Power in War and Conquest
CHAPTER I
A NEW FACTOR
While the original purpose of railways was to promote the arts of
peace, the wide scope of their possibilities in the direction, also, of
furthering the arts of war began to be realised at a very early date
after their success in the former capacity had been assured in Great
Britain.
Already the canal system had introduced an innovation which greatly
impressed the British public. In December, 1806, a considerable body of
troops went by barge on the Paddington Canal from London to Liverpool,
_en route_ for Dublin, relays of fresh horses for the canal boats being
provided at all the stages in order to facilitate the transport; and in
referring to this event _The Times_ of December 19, 1806, remarked:--"By
this mode of conveyance the men will be only seven days in reaching
Liverpool, and with comparatively little fatigue, as it would take them
above fourteen days to march that distance."
But when, on the opening of the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, in
1830, a British regiment was conveyed thereon, in two hours, a journey
of thirty-four miles, which they would have required two days to
accomplish on foot, far-seeing men became still more impressed, and
began to realise that there had, indeed, been introduced a new factor
destined to exercise a powerful influence on the future conduct of war.
The geographical position of the United Kingdom led, in those early
days, to greater importance being attached to the conveniences of
railways as a means of transport than to their actual strategical and
tactical advantages; and the issue by the War Office, in 1846, of a
"Regulation Relative to the Conveyance of Her Majesty's Forces, their
Baggage and Stores, by Rail," may have appeared to meet the requirements
of the immediate situation, so far as this country was concerned.
On the Continent of Europe, however, the rivalry of nations divided from
one another only by a more or less uncertain or varying frontier, and
still powerfully influenced by the recollection of recent conflicts,
resulted in much greater attention being paid to the possibilities of
the new development.
The first definite proposals for the use of railways for strategical
purposes were advanced, as early as 1833, by Friedrich Wilhelm Harkort,
a Westphalian worthy who came to be better known in his native land
as "Der alte Harkort." A participant in the Napoleonic wars, he had
subsequently shown great energy and enterprise in the development of
steam engines, hydraulic presses, iron-making, and other important
industries in Germany; he had been the first writer in that country to
give an account--as he did in 1825--of the progress England was making
in respect to railways and steamships; and he had, in 1826, placed a
working model of a railway in the garden of the Elberfeld Museum. These
various efforts he followed up, in 1833, by bringing forward in the
Westphalian Landtag a scheme for the building of a railway to connect
the Weser and the Lippe. Later in the same year he published "Die
Eisenbahn von Minden nach Köln," in which he laid special stress on the
value to Germany of the proposed line from a military point of view.
With the help of such a railway, he argued, it would be possible to
concentrate large bodies of troops at a given point much more speedily
than if they marched by road; he made calculations as to what the actual
saving in time, as well as in physical strain, would be in transporting
Prussian troops from various specified centres to others; and he
proceeded:--
Let us suppose that we had a railway and a telegraph line
on the right bank of the Rhine, from Mainz to Wesel. Any
crossing of the Rhine by the French would then scarcely be
possible, since we should be able to bring a strong defensive
force on the spot before the attempt could be developed.
These things may appear very strange to-day; yet in the womb
of the future there slumbers the seed of great developments in
railways, the results of which it is, as yet, quite beyond our
powers to foresee.
Harkort's proposals gave rise to much vigorous controversy in Germany.
The official classes condemned as "nonsensical fancies" his ideas, not
only as to the usefulness of railways for the conveyance of troops, but,
also, as to the utility of railways for any practical purposes whatever;
and contemporary newspapers and periodicals, in turn, made him the butt
of their ridicule.
The pros and cons of the use of railways for military purposes were,
none the less, actively discussed in numerous pamphlets and treatises.
Just as, in France, General Rumigny, adjutant to Louis-Philippe, had
already foreshadowed the possibility of a sudden invasion by a German
army reaching the frontier by rail, so, also, in Germany, in the words
of one writer at this period, "anxious spirits shudder at the thought
that, some fine spring morning, a hundred thousand Frenchmen, thirsting
for war, will suddenly invade our peaceful valleys at bird-like speed,
thanks to the new means of locomotion, and begin their old game (_das
alte Spiel_) over again." On the other hand there were military
sceptics--such as the author of a pamphlet "Uber die Militärische
Benutzung der Eisenbahnen" (Berlin, 1836)--who, basing their
calculations on locomotive performances up to that date, asserted that,
although the railway might be of service in the conveyance of supplies,
guns and ammunition, it would be of no advantage in the transport of
troops. These, they declared, would get to their destination sooner if
they marched.[1]
The most noticeable of the various publications issued in Germany at
this period was a book by Carl Eduard Pönitz ("Pz."), which appeared
at Adorf, Saxony, in 1842, under the title of "Die Eisenbahnen
als militärische Operationslinien betrachtet, und durch Beispiele
erlaütert." The writer of this remarkable book (of which a second
edition was issued in 1853) gave a comprehensive survey of the whole
situation in regard to railways and war, so far as the subject could
be dealt with in the light of railway developments and of actual
experiences of troop movements by rail down to that time; and he argued
strongly in favour of the advantages to be derived from the employment
of railways for military purposes. He even suggested that, in the event
of an inadequate supply of locomotives, or of operations having to be
conducted in a mountainous country where locomotives could not be used
for heavy traffic, the troops might still use their own horses to draw
the coaches and wagons along the railway lines, so that the men would
arrive fresh and fit for immediate fighting at the end of their journey.
Describing railways as the most powerful vehicle for the advancement of
"Kultur" since the invention of printing, Pönitz showed how Belgium and
Saxony were the two countries which had taken the initiative in railway
construction on the Continent of Europe; and his references to the
former country are especially deserving of being recalled, in view of
recent events. He pointed to the good example which had been set by the
"far-sighted and energetic" King of the Belgians, and continued:--
Although, in a land torn asunder by revolutionary factions,
many wounds were still bleeding; and although the newly-created
kingdom was threatened by foes within and without and could
organise means of resistance only with great difficulty, there
was, nevertheless, taken in hand a scheme for the construction
of a network of railways designed to extend over the entire
country, while at the present moment the greater part of
that scheme has, in fact, been carried out. In this way King
Leopold has raised up for himself a memorial the full value
and significance of which may, perhaps, be appreciated only by
generations yet to come.
While Belgium was thus shown to have been setting a good example, the
only railways which Prussia then had in actual operation (apart from
the Berlin-Stettin and the Berlin-Breslau lines, which had been begun,
and others which had been projected) were the Berlin-Potsdam and the
Berlin-Magdeburg-Leipzig lines; though Saxony had the Leipzig-Dresden
line, and Bavaria the Nüremberg-Fürth and the Munich-Augsburg lines.
Pönitz, however, excused the backwardness of Prussia on the ground
that if her Government had refused, for a long time, to sanction
various projected railways, or had imposed heavy obligations in
regard to them, such action was due, not to prejudice, but to "a wise
foresight"--meaning, presumably, that Prussia was waiting to profit by
the experience that other countries were gaining at their own cost.
Having dealt with all the arguments he could advance in favour of the
general principle of employing railways for military purposes, Pönitz
proceeded to elaborate a scheme for the construction of a network of
strategical lines serving the whole of Germany, though intended, more
especially, to protect her frontiers against attack by either France
or Russia. Without, he said, being in the secrets of international
politics, he thought he might safely presume that Germany's only fear of
attack was from one of these two directions; and, although the relations
of the Great Powers of Europe were then peaceful, a continuance of those
conditions could not, of course, be guaranteed. So, he proceeded--
We have to look to these two fronts; and, if we want
to avoid the risk of heavy losses at the outset, we needs
must--also at the outset--be prepared to meet the enemy there
with an overwhelming force. Every one knows that the strength of
an army is multiplied by movements which are rapid in themselves
and allow of the troops arriving at the end of their journey
without fatigue.
In a powerful appeal--based on motives alike of patriotism, of national
defence and of economic advantage--that his fellow-countrymen should
support the scheme he thus put forward, Pönitz once more pointed to
Belgium, saying:--
The youngest of all the European States has given us an
example of what can be done by intelligence and good will.
The network of Belgian railways will be of as much advantage
in advancing the industries of that country as it will be in
facilitating the defence of the land against attack by France.
It will increase alike Belgium's prosperity and Belgium's
security. And we Germans, who place so high a value on our
intelligence, and are scarcely yet inclined to recognise the
political independence of the Belgian people, shall we remain so
blind as not to see what is needed for our own safety?
Pönitz could not, of course, anticipate in 1842 that the time would
come when his country, acting to the full on the advice he was then
giving, would have her strategic railways, not only to the French and
the Russian, but, also, to the Belgian frontier, and would use those in
the last-mentioned direction to crush remorselessly the little nation
concerning which he himself was using words of such generous sympathy
and approbation.
The ideas and proposals put forward by Pönitz (of whose work a French
translation, under the title of "Essai sur les Chemins de Fer,
considérés commes lignes d'opérations militaires," was published by L.
A. Unger in Paris, in 1844) did much to stimulate the discussion of the
general question, while the military authorities of Germany were moved
to make investigations into it on their own account, there being issued
in Berlin, about 1848 or 1850, a "Survey of the Traffic and Equipment of
German and of neighbouring foreign Railways for military purposes, based
on information collected by the Great General Staff."[2]
In France, also, there were those who, quite early in the days of the
new means of transport, predicted the important service it was likely to
render for the purposes of war no less than for those of peace.
General Lamarque declared in the French Chamber of Deputies in 1832, or
1833, that the strategical use of railways would lead to "a revolution
in military science as great as that which had been brought about by the
use of gunpowder."
At the sitting of the Chamber on May 25, 1833, M. de Bérigny, in urging
the "incontestable" importance of railways, said:--
From the point of view of national defence, what advantages
do they not present! An army, with all its material, could, in a
few days, be transported from the north to the south, from the
east to the west, of France. If a country could thus speedily
carry considerable masses of troops to any given point on its
frontiers, would it not become invincible, and would it not,
also, be in a position to effect great economies in its military
expenditure?
In a further debate on June 8, 1837, M. Dufaure declared that railways
had a greater mission to fulfil than that of offering facilities to
industry or than that of conferring benefits on private interests. Was
it a matter of no account, he asked, that they should be able in one
night to send troops to all the frontiers of France, from Paris to
the banks of the Rhine, from Lyons to the foot of the Alps, with an
assurance of their arriving fresh and ready for combat?
Then, in 1842, M. Marschall, advocating the construction of a line from
Paris to Strasburg, predicted that any new invasion of France by Germany
would most probably be attempted between Metz and Strasburg. He further
said:--
It is there that the German Confederation is converging
a formidable system of railways from Cologne, Mayence and
Mannheim.... Twenty-four hours will suffice for our neighbours
to concentrate on the Rhine the forces of Prussia, Austria and
the Confederation, and on the morrow an army of 400,000 men
could invade our territory by that breach of forty leagues
between Thionville and Lauterburg, which are the outposts of
Strasburg and Metz. Three months later, the reserve system
organised in Prussia and in some of the other German States
would allow of a second Army being sent of equal force to the
other. The title of "aggressive lines" given by our neighbours
to these railways leave us with no room for doubt as to their
intentions. Studies for an expedition against Paris by way of
Lorraine and Champagne can hardly be regarded as indicative of a
sentiment of fraternity.
France, however, had no inclination at that time to build railways
designed to serve military purposes, whether from the point of view of
aggression or even from that of national defence; so that in a letter to
his brother Ludwig, written April 13, 1844, von Moltke, then a member
of the General Staff of the Fourth Army Corps of the Prussian Army,
declared that whilst Germany was building railways, the French Chamber
was only discussing them. This was so far the case that when, later on,
Germany had nearly 3,300 miles of railway France was operating only a
little over 1,000 miles.
Apart from the experiences, on quite a small scale, which had been
obtained on the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, the earliest example
of what railways could do in the transport of large bodies of troops
was afforded in 1846, when Prussia's Sixth Army Corps--consisting
of over 12,000 men, together with horses, guns, road vehicles and
ammunition--was moved by rail, upon two lines, to Cracow. In 1849 a
Russian corps of 30,000 men, with all its equipment, was taken by rail
from its cantonments in Poland to Göding, Moravia, whence it effected a
junction with the Austrian army. There was, also, a certain movement of
German troops by rail to Schleswig-Holstein in the troubles of 1848-50;
but of greater importance than these other instances was the transport
of an Austrian army of 75,000 men, 8,000 horses and 1,000 vehicles from
Vienna and Hungary to the Silesian frontier in the early winter of 1850.
It is true that, owing to the combined disadvantages of single-line
railways, inadequate staff and rolling stock, unfavourable weather, lack
of previous preparations and of transport regulations, and delays from
various unforeseen causes, no fewer than twenty-six days were occupied
in the transport, although the journey was one of only about 150 miles.
It was, also, admitted that the troops could have marched the distance
in the same time. All the same, as told by Regierungsrat Wernekke,[3]
the movement of so large a body of troops by rail at all was regarded
as especially instructive. It was the cause of greater attention being
paid to the use of railways for military purposes, while it further led
(1) to the drawing up, in May, 1851, of a scheme for the construction
throughout the Austrian monarchy of railways from the special point
of view of strategical requirements; and (2) to a reorganisation of
the methods hitherto adopted for the transport of troops by rail, the
result being that the next considerable movement in Austria--in the year
1853--was conducted with "unprecedented regularity and efficiency," and
this, also, without any cessation of the ordinary traffic of the lines
concerned.
In 1851 a further striking object lesson of the usefulness of railways
was afforded by the moving of a division of 14,500 men, with nearly
2,000 horses, 48 guns and 464 vehicles, from Cracow to Hradish,
a distance of 187 miles, in two days. Reckoning that a large column
of troops, with all its impedimenta, would march twelve miles per
day, and allowing for one day's rest in seven, the movement would, in
this instance, have occupied fifteen days by road instead of two days
by rail.
It was in the _Italian campaign of 1859_ that railways first played a
conspicuous part in actual warfare, both strategically and tactically.
"In this campaign," said Major Millar, R.A., V.C., of the Topographical
Staff, in two lectures delivered by him at the Royal United Service
Institution in 1861[4]--
Railways assisted the ordinary means of locomotion hitherto
employed by armies. By them thousands of men were carried
daily through France to Toulon, Marseilles, or the foot of
Mont Cenis; by them troops were hastened up to the very fields
of battle; and by them injured men were brought swiftly back
to the hospitals, still groaning in the first agony of their
wounds. Moreover, the railway cuttings, embankments and bridges
presented features of importance equal or superior to the
ordinary accidents of the ground, and the possession of which
was hotly contested. If you go to Magenta you will see, close
to the railway platform on which you alight, an excavation full
of rough mounds and simple black crosses, erected to mark the
resting-places of many hundred men who fell in the great fight.
This first employment of railways in close connection with vast
military operations would alone be enough to give a distinction
to this campaign in military history.
The French railways, especially, attained a remarkable degree of
success. In eighty-six days--from April 19 to July 15--they transported
an aggregate of 604,000 men and over 129,000 horses, including nearly
228,000 men and 37,000 horses sent to Culox, Marseilles, Toulon,
Grenoble and Aix by lines in the south-east. The greatest movements
took place during the ten days from April 20 to April 30, when the
Paris-Lyons Company, without interrupting the ordinary traffic, conveyed
an average per day of 8,421 men and 512 horses. On April 25, a maximum
of 12,138 men and 655 horses was attained. During the eighty-six days
there were run on the lines of the same company a total of 2,636 trains,
including 253 military specials. It was estimated that the 75,966 men
and 4,469 horses transported by rail from Paris to the Mediterranean
or to the frontiers of the Kingdom of Sardinia between April 20 and
April 30 would have taken sixty days to make the journey by road. In
effect, the rate of transit by rail was six times greater than the rate
of progress by marching would have been, and this, again, was about
double as fast as the best achievement recorded up to that time on the
German railways. The Chasseurs de Vincennes are described as leaving
the station at Turin full of vigour and activity, and with none of the
fatigue or the reduction in numbers which would have occurred had they
made the journey by road.
As against, however, the advantage thus gained by the quicker transport
of the French troops to the seat of war, due to the successful manner
in which the railways were operated, there had to be set some serious
defects in administrative organisation. When the men got to the end
of their rail journey there was a more or less prolonged waiting for
the food and other necessaries which were to follow. There were grave
deficiencies, also, in the dispatch of the subsequent supplies. On June
25, the day after the defeat of the Austrians, the French troops had
no provisions at all for twenty-four hours, except some biscuits which
were so mouldy that no one could eat them. Their horses, also, were
without fodder. In these circumstances it was impossible to follow up
the Austrians in their retreat beyond the Mincio.
Thus the efficiency of the French railways was to a large extent
negatived by the inefficiency of the military administration; and in
these respects France had a foretaste, in 1859, of experiences to be
repeated on a much graver scale in the Franco-German War of 1870-71.
As regards the Austrians, they improved but little on their admittedly
poor performance in 1850, in spite of the lessons they appeared to
have learned as the result of their experiences on that occasion.
Government and railways were alike unprepared. Little or no real attempt
at organisation in time of peace had been made, and, in the result,
trains were delayed or blocked, and stations got choked with masses
of supplies which could not be forwarded. At Vienna there was such a
deficiency of rolling stock--accelerated by great delays in the return
of empties--that many of the troop trains for the South could not be
made up until the last moment. Even then the average number of men they
conveyed did not exceed about 360. At Laibach there was much congestion
because troops had to wait there for instructions as to their actual
destination. Other delays occurred because, owing to the heavy gradients
of the Semmering Pass, each train had to be divided into three sections
before it could proceed. Between, again, Innsbruck and Bozen the railway
was still incomplete, and the First Corps (about 40,000 men and 10,000
horses) had to march between these two points on their journey from
Prague to Verona. Notwithstanding this fact, it was estimated that they
covered in fourteen days a journey which would have taken sixty-four
days if they had marched all the way. From Vienna to Lombardy the Third
Army Corps (20,000 men, 5,500 horses, with guns, ammunition and 300
wagons) was carried by rail in fourteen days, the rate of progress
attained being four and a half times greater than by road marching,
though still inferior by one and a half times to what the French
troop-trains had accomplished.
On both sides important reinforcements were brought up at critical
periods during the progress of the war. Referring to the attacks by
the allies on Casteggio and Montebello, Count Gyulai, the Austrian
General, wrote:--"The enemy soon displayed a superior force, which was
continually increased by arrivals from the railway"; and the special
correspondent of _The Times_, writing from Pavia on May 21, 1859, said:--
From the heights of Montebello the Austrians beheld a
novelty in the art of war. Train after train arrived by railway
from Voghera, each train disgorging its hundreds of armed men
and immediately hastening back for more. In vain Count Stadion
endeavoured to crush the force behind him before it could be
increased enough to overpower him.
Then, also, the good use made of the railways by the allies in carrying
out their important flanking movement against the Austrians at Vercelli
gave further evidence of the fact that rail-power was a new force which
could be employed, not alone for the earlier concentration of troops at
the seat of war, but, also, in support of strategic developments on the
battle-field itself. Commenting on this fact the _Spectateur Militaire_
said, in its issue for September, 1869:--
Les chemins de fer ont joué un rôle immense dans cette
concentration. C'est la première fois que, dans l'histoire
militaire, ils servent d'une manière aussi merveilleuse et
entrent dans les combinaisons stratégiques.
While these observations were fully warranted by the results
accomplished in regard to concentration, reinforcements and tactical
movements by rail, the campaign also brought out more clearly than
ever before the need, if railways were to fulfil their greatest
possible measure of utility in time of war, of working out in advance
all important details likely to arise in connection with the movement
of troops, instead--as in the case of the Austrians, at least--of
neglecting any serious attempt at organisation until the need arose for
immediate action.
From all these various points of view the Italian campaign of 1859
marked a further important stage in the early development of that new
factor which the employment of railways for the purposes of warfare
represented; though far greater results in the same direction were to
be brought about, shortly afterwards, by the American Civil War of
1861-65. Not only does the real development of rail-power as a new arm
in war date therefrom, but the War of Secession was to establish in a
pre-eminent degree (1) the possibility, through the use of railways,
of carrying on operations at a considerable distance from the base
of supplies; (2) the need of a special organisation to deal alike
with restoration of railway lines destroyed by the enemy and with the
interruption, in turn, of the enemy's own communications; and (3) the
difficulties that may arise as between the military element and the
technical (railway) element in regard to the control and operation of
railways during war. To each of these subjects it is proposed to devote
a separate chapter.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] In 1847 one of the leading military writers in Germany published a
pamphlet in which he sought to prove that the best-organised railway
could not carry 10,000 Infantry a distance equal to sixty English miles
in twenty-four hours. As for the conveyance of Cavalry and Artillery by
train, he declared that this would be a sheer impossibility.
[2] "Uebersicht des Verkehrs und der Betriebsmittel auf den inländischen
und den benachbarten ausländischen Eisenbahnen für militärischen Zwecke;
nach dem beim grossen Generalstabe vorhanden Materialen zusammen
gestellt."
[3] "Die Mitwirkung der Eisenbahn an den Kriegen in Mitteleuropa."
"Archiv für Eisenbahnwesen," Juli und August, 1912.
[4] "Journal of the Royal United Service Institution," vol. v, pp.
269-308. London, 1861.