Between Flesh and Steel (2 page)

The most significant invention in weaponry of the Hundred Years' War was gunpowder, which when coupled with new techniques for casting metal produced the primitive cannon. Siege mortars used to batter down castle walls quickly came into widespread use. In 1453, the Ottoman armies used cannon to destroy the walls of Constantinople, bringing the Byzantine Empire to an end. Mobile siege guns played a leading role in several battles of the Hundred Years' War,
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which also saw the first
effective use of field artillery in Europe. True field artillery appeared in the final decade of the fifteenth century when the French mounted light cast bronze cannon on two-wheeled, horse-drawn carriages. The introduction of the trunnion—a device for raising and lowering the gun independently of the carriage—increased the soldier's ability to aim these guns with greater accuracy. By the seventeenth century, gun manufacture had progressed to where the range, power, and types of guns would change little for the next two centuries.

During the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, gunpowder was revolutionizing the battlefield. The appearance of the musketeer, the forerunner of the modern rifleman, and his firelock musket made it possible for the first time for tightly packed infantry formations to stop cavalry without engaging in close combat. The slow rate of fire of these early weapons, however, required that musketeers be protected from the hostile advance, a problem that led to mixing musketeer formations with those of pikemen. Although the mix of pike to musket changed considerably over the next three hundred years, the mixed infantry formation remained the basic infantry formation during that time.

The cavalry most immediately felt the effect of portable firearms on the battlefield. The invention of the wheel lock allowed the soldier to aim and fire the pistol with one hand. As the introduction of pike and musket to the infantry reduced the shock effect of cavalry, the cavalry armed itself with saber and pistol and began to rely more on mobility and firepower than on shock.
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After more than a thousand-year interregnum, infantry again became the arm of decision on the battlefield. Leaders now used the cavalry, no longer decisive, to pin the flanks of infantry formations so that they could rake them with artillery and musket fire. At the same time, the siege mortar gave way to the smoothbore cannon that could function as genuine field artillery. By the seventeenth century, genuine horse artillery had replaced horse-drawn artillery, and all members of artillery units rode into battle. This development greatly increased the flexibility and mobility of field artillery, making it a full partner in the newly emerging maneuver warfare.
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By the sixteenth century, the feudal order was creaking toward its demise, and in its place arose the nation state governed by the absolute monarch in command of a permanent standing army. The professional army was the instrument of creating and protecting the nation state. Whereas feudal armies had attempted to capture the enemy's strong points, the new armies engaged in wars of attrition with the primary goal of destroying the enemy's armed force. The time was right for the ideology of
nationalism and dynastic rivalry to propel a new round of national conflicts, which, in turn, would spawn yet another generation of new and more destructive weapons.

The Thirty Years' War was the most destructive of these conflicts. What began as a clash of feudal armies ended by setting the stage for the emergence of modern war. During this period, the musket revolutionized the role of infantry. The original musket was a firelock, itself a great improvement on the earlier matchlock, which had required a forked stand to hold its long barrel. The rifleman had to ignite the powder in the touchhole with a hand-held burning wick, conditions that made the weapon impossible to aim or fire quickly. The firelock used a trigger attached to a rod that moved a serpentine burning wick to the touchhole, thereby allowing the rifleman to hold the weapon with both hands and aim. The lighter, more reliable, and more mobile firelock could fire a round every two to three minutes. For the first time the infantry had a relatively reliable and accurate weapon.

The firelock was later replaced by the wheel lock, in which a rotating geared wheel powered by a cocked spring caused a flint to ignite the powder in the flash pan. A century later, the wheel lock was replaced by the flintlock, in which a spring-loaded hammer struck a flint to ignite the charge. By the 1800s, the percussion cap, a truly reliable system, had replaced the former mechanism. With each development, the rifle became more certain to fire on cue and the rate of fire increased.

Corned gunpowder was another significant innovation of this period. Early gunpowder for rifles and cannon tended to separate into its component materials when the powder was stored for long periods or when moved in the logistics train. The separation made it unlikely that the powder would explode evenly in the rifle barrel, increasing misfires and propelling the bullet at much lower velocity. Corned powder was made of component materials shaped into little nuggets that reduced settling and made the powder more certain to fire evenly, maintaining the projectile's velocity. This configuration resulted in longer range and deadlier firearms and cannon.
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In the sixteenth century, the rifleman carried his powder and ball, ranging from .44- to .51-caliber lead shot, in small leather bags. In rainy weather, the weapons often would not fire because of damp powder. In the Thirty Years' War King Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden (1594–1632) invented the paper cartridge, which protected the powder from dampness and greatly improved the rifle's reliability. Musketeers could now fire two rounds a minute instead of a single round every two or three minutes. By the end of the American Civil War (1861–1865), the completely self-contained modern cartridge with powder and bullet in a single metal container made
its appearance. By the Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871, the breech-loading rifle had become standard issue for European armies. Two decades later, the clip- and magazine-fed infantry rifle revolutionized infantry tactics. The breech-loading, clip-fed, bolt or lever action rifle made it unnecessary for the rifleman to stand or kneel to reload. This freedom of action made the introduction of modern dispersed infantry tactics possible and further increased the infantry's ability to fire and maneuver.
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Regardless of the type of firing mechanism, the musket remained an inaccurate weapon with limited range and a slow rate of fire until the American Civil War. The smoothbore musket was usually ineffective beyond 100 yards. By the early 1700s, the British Brown Bess could hit a man at 80 yards with some regularity. The Americans truly revolutionized riflery when they invented the first reliable rifled barrel, the famed Kentucky rifle. The invention of rifling made it possible to hit a target reliably at l80 yards, increasing the range and accuracy of infantry rifle fire by a factor of three.
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The rifle changed the tactical battlefield. In feudal armies, infantry was packed into dense squares to maximize firepower and to resist shock from cavalry attack. As the rifle became more reliable and firepower became deadlier at longer range, it became possible to thin out the packed masses of infantry into lines while still providing sufficient firepower and defense against cavalry. Gustavus Adolphus was the first to deploy his infantry in lines four men deep, alternating pikemen with musketeers. This innovation represented the birth of linear tactics, a tactical arrangement that remained unchanged in its essentials until almost the twentieth century. Linear tactics provided the infantry with yet more mobility without sacrificing firepower or defense, opening the way for more sophisticated battlefield maneuvers and tactical deployments. No longer the primary striking force, the pikeman had the task of protecting the musketeers from cavalry attack. As muskets became more reliable, powerful, and accurate, thinner and thinner infantry formations could be used without sacrificing killing power until, finally, the pikeman disappeared from the field altogether.

The legacy of the pikeman remained, however, in the form of the bayonet, which is still standard issue in modern armies. The first one, a plug bayonet, was inserted into the rifle's muzzle. Because it made the firearm inoperable, the musketeer had to rely heavily upon the pikeman for protection. By the end of the seventeenth century, the ring bayonet made its appearance. Attached to a plug below the rifle barrel, this apparatus allowed the rifle to fire while the bayonet was in place, but the attachment
was clumsy and unreliable. The standard barrel bayonet attached to a permanent stud welded to the rifle barrel appeared shortly afterward, and within a decade it became standard issue in all European armies.
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The musketeer had now become his own pikeman. Musket infantry was expected to protect itself from cavalry attack and, when closing with the enemy, to fight hand to hand with the bayonet. By combining the functions of the musketeer with the pikeman, all infantry could now be armed with firearms, greatly increasing the killing power of the infantry. In 1746, the British infantry first used the fluted bayonet at the Battle of Culloden Moor, and it has remained a basic close combat tool of the infantryman ever since.
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Still other advances increased the power of infantry. In the mid-1700s, the Prussians introduced a standard-size iron ramrod to replace the nonstandard wooden rod. When coupled with proper training of the soldier, it doubled the musket's rate of fire.
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At the same time, the infantry began to diversify its weapons' capability with a primitive hand grenade. The first hand grenades were hollow iron balls packed with black powder ignited by a burning wick. Within a decade, the infantry grenadier had become a standard feature of European infantry formations.

The most significant advances in firepower and range came in artillery.
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At the beginning of the Thirty Years' War, individual craftsmen still cast artillery by hand, so no two guns or barrels were exactly alike. The weight of these artillery pieces was too great to make them mobile enough for effective use against troop formations, although they served well in sieges. Gustavus Adolphus standardized not only the size of cannon and shot, producing the first lightweight artillery guns, but also infantry barrels and musket shot. Adopted almost universally, this system of millimeter caliber measurement is still used by most modern armies.
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Adolphus standardized artillery firing procedure as well, and his artillery gunners could fire eight rounds from a single gun in the time it took a musketeer with a firelock to load and fire a single round.
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Over the next century, the French introduced a number of innovations in artillery, including mounting the gun on wheeled carriages and introducing the trunnion to improve aiming. Until this time, horses usually pulled the artillery guns, while the artillery crews walked behind. This arrangement slowed the artillery's mobility, and it was common practice never to move the guns once deployed on the battlefield. Frederick the Great of Prussia (1712–1786) introduced the idea of mounting the guns and gun crews on horseback and wagons, so that guns, crews, and ammunition could all move together. The invention of horse artillery greatly increased the mobility of field artillery, and commanders could routinely move the guns around
and change deployments for maximum effect.
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At the same time, their guns were becoming lighter and equipped with more accurate aiming mechanisms. The result was the emergence of a deadly combat arm, field artillery, that over time would be responsible for more casualties than any other weapon.

The range of artillery gradually increased as well, and by the Napoleonic era, cannon fire could reach three hundred yards, or about the range of a Roman ballista. Until the Crimean War (1853–1856), 70 percent of all cannon shot was solid ball shot. But as early as the 1740s, artillery gunners had various types of artillery rounds at their disposal. Howitzers primarily used heavy rounds that exploded on contact, and artillery guns with a flatter trajectory of fire used canister, chain, and grape-shot against cavalry and infantry formations. Later, these rounds were coupled with exploding charges that made it possible to burst artillery rounds over the enemy's heads, considerably increasing lethality and casualties. During the American Civil War, rifled cannon came into its own, with a corresponding increase in range and accuracy. Later, advances in breech loading, gas canister sealing, and recoil mechanisms vastly improved rates of fire.

The killing power of infantry and artillery drove cavalry from the field as a major killing arm. Horse cavalry gradually became lighter, and being armed with pistols, carbines, and sabers, it was relegated to filling the gaps in the line, performing reconnaissance, conducting raids, and protecting the flanks of the infantry. Cavalry did not return as a major battlefield player until the end of World War I, when the internal combustion engine made possible the first primitive tanks.
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The period between the fifteenth and seventeenth centuries witnessed the emergence and consolidation of the nation state as the primary form of sociopolitical organization and as the most dynamic actor in international affairs. With the collapse of feudalism, the new dynastic social orders of the West developed different forms of social, political, economic, and military organization, all of which eventually influenced the course of weapons development and the conduct of war. At the beginning of the period, monarchy was the most common form of domestic political organization of the nation state. By the seventeenth century, national monarchs had gradually subdued or destroyed all competing centers of political power and parochial loyalty within their national borders. The age of absolutism, when national monarchs wielded absolute power over their politico-social orders, had begun. Consequently,
various monarchs declared war upon one another at will, often over trivial and personal concerns, for almost a hundred years.