Grand thread: Artillery or Musket fire, what did most?

[userstupidname]

I am very intrigued to know which military part did most kills in the 1600-1900th century (Using english century thingy so its really 1500th to 1800th)


Observe that every post with a claim will/must have sources, Wikipedia is not acceptable however if the text in Wikipedia have a source attached to it, post that.


Sources people

People, sources.

Use sources people, please.

I am mostly wondering because people usually state one of the things but have never provided real sources for their statements. It has also been used in balance discussions.

[MatrixStorm]

Wikipedia is not acceptable however if the text in Wikipedia have a source attached to it, post that.

What is the difference with an ordinary site about 'which military part did most kills in the 1600-1900th century' and Wikipedia?

Nothing on the internet is 100% approved to be true.

Just be happy that there is a website like Wikipedia...

[Tim_Ward]

I predict that:

1) this will be punted to yonder historical research forum. *points upward*

2) Some historically knowledgeable individual will give you an answer that boils down to 'it depends on the battle'

[♔DoomBunny666♔]

Uhm Musket fire cannon fire acounted about 12% musket about 70% sabre about 20% and bayonet about 2%, thats as much as I remember...

[Redalvilgeshki]

But to disect that statistic more so; with the introduction of Light Infantry, Light troops accounted for more kills then any other branch of the army.

[userstupidname]

according to what source?? I really want to know this, but i must get sources

[Hannover]

That depends on the situation, naval or army ? siege, battlefield? Then it depends on what type of fort ie. wooden, earthen, or stone?

The deadliest was disease, 76% during the AWI for Americans, 71% 1812. source Nuclear Biological Chemical Warfare. USMC FMF NBC001 1982 1-3

[Astaroth]

Moved to the Historical Research Center.

[Skuffy9790]

Duffy, Christopher. The Military Experience in the Age of Reason. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth. 1998.
First published, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. 1987

pages 245-6

It is impossible to establish exactly what proportions of casualties were inflicted by the various weapons. The most convincing evidence appears at first sight to come from records like those of the Invalides in Paris, which detail the admissions for 1762 as follows:

68.8% wounded by small arms

13.4% wounded by artillery

14.7% wounded by swords

2.4% wounded by bayonets

(Corvisier, 1964, 65)

However, these were by definition survivable wounds. The proportion of casualties inflicted by the sword is greatly exaggerated as a result, just as the effect of artillery is very much understated.

Hope that helps

[userstupidname]

Duffy, Christopher. The Military Experience in the Age of Reason. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth. 1998.
First published, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. 1987

pages 245-6
Quote:
It is impossible to establish exactly what proportions of casualties were inflicted by the various weapons. The most convincing evidence appears at first sight to come from records like those of the Invalides in Paris, which detail the admissions for 1762 as follows:

68.8% wounded by small arms

13.4% wounded by artillery

14.7% wounded by swords

2.4% wounded by bayonets

(Corvisier, 1964, 65)

However, these were by definition survivable wounds. The proportion of casualties inflicted by the sword is greatly exaggerated as a result, just as the effect of artillery is very much understated.
Hope that helps

Yes thank you, this source backed up material is what i am looking for, i hope i get more around different periods and different sources.

[Cholera]

This is an interesting topic ... I'm generally an enthusiast of the history of warfare and took some good courses in college on it, so here's some information based what I remember reading and what I just found online from a few minutes searching on Google/ JSTOR. Attached are two old British papers (Hodge, 1856, and Greenwood, 1942) that analyze some casualty figures, comparing the Napoleonic Wars with the Crimean War and World War I.

The first (obvious) fact is that disease caused more deaths than battles for any major war before the medical revolution starting in the late 19th century. The ratio of deaths from disease and from combat decreased slightly in the mid 1800's and dramatically after 1900. From the Napoleonic Wars, Hodge writes that only about 18% of all deaths in the British Army and 10% in the Navy were due to combat, with the remainder to disease and accidents, with a total ratio is about 8:1. An average soldier in the British Army during the war had a 4.9% chance of dying from disease and 0.6% from combat. For a laugh, take a look at the Walcheren Campaign (1809- http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walcheren_Campaign), where in 3 months of non-fighting in swampy ground, a British force of 40,000 lost about 4,000 from disease and 100 from actual combat!

From the Crimean War (1853-1856), Hodge writes that 1,900 out of the 9,700 British deaths were due to combat, for about 20%. In the US Civil War, the ratio is about 2:1, so that 33% of deaths were from combat. But by WWI (see the Greenwood paper), the ratio flipped to 1 to 5.1, so that about 84% of all deaths were due to combat. I've read that for the US military in WWII <5% of all deaths were from disease in all theaters.

However, you seem to be more interested in the specific cause of battlefield death, which has spottier statistics. From what would seem like an authoritative source (Tactics and the Experience of Battle in the Age of Napoleon, Rory Muir, 2000 - http://books.google.com/books?id=_03...age&q=&f=false) there are no actual sources of statistics on battlefield casualties by weapon in the Napoleonic Wars. He in fact uses the hospital figures from 1762 that were posted earlier, and those from American Civil War as the only sources of (incomplete) information to make estimates from (p 45-46). This suggests there are no better sources of information in this period.

In the 1762 casualty figures, the breakdown is about 69% bullets/14% artillery/16% edged weapons. Muir extrapolates (based on a higher death: casualty ratio for artillery) that a maximum of only about 20% of deaths were caused by artillery during the Napoleonic War. The Hodge paper has a typical battle in the Crimean War (where they still used smoothbore muzzle-loading muskets and artillery) where the breakdown was 65% bullets/29% artillery/6% edged. So I think something in between was true for the Napoleonic War, with a breakdown somewhere around 65%/25%/10%.

This totally changes in the US Civil War due to the Minie ball and rifled weapons for every soldier, and mismatched Napoleonic tactics with this technology. From Muir, you had 95% of all casualties (and maybe 90% of deaths) caused by bullets alone, and only a max of 10% from artillery. From I've read that bladed weapons fell to 2%.

The stats change again in WWI, when artillery became king due mainly to effective explosive shells (ETW has explosive shells that are way too "good" for the period), and still mismatch in tactics to technology, with a lack of dispersion in trench warfare/ mass infantry charges like the Somme. From memory, the breakdown of deaths was about 75% to artillery, with the remainder split between machine guns (~15%) and rifles (~10%). Machine guns were NOT the main source of casualties in that war, btw, though they are remembered as a horror likely because you could anticipate having to face them rather than the randomness of death by explosives.

Finally, the match in dispersed tactics and tech was better in WWII among European/US armies. This page has some stats for the US Army: http://www.koreanwar-educator.org/to...eral/p_ch3.htm . Bullets accounted for 32% of deaths and explosive shells (tanks and artillery) about 50%. Interesting enough, bombs (from airplanes) only caused 1.4% of US deaths in that war - this likely was much higher for all other armies, especially the Germans and Russians.

Well, hope that info helps ^^

[Cholera]

Err, here's the 1942 paper I was talking about. The other one's pdf is too big, but the info is here:
On the Mortality Arising from Military Operations
Author(s): William Barwick Hodge
Source: Journal of the Statistical Society of London, Vol. 19, No. 3 (Sep., 1856), pp. 219-271
Published by: Blackwell Publishing for the Royal Statistical Society
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2338189

[Didz]

By far the biggest killer was disease.

In the Peninsula Campaign the British Army lost 8,889 men as a result of comabt related injuries, and 24,930 from sickness and disease, including 'Black Lion' a particularly violent form of syphilis.

At Walcheren in April out of an initial force of 39,214 only 4,000 remained fit for duty when the army was finally withdrawn in December. There were 106 battle casualties, but 4,175 alone died from 'Walcheren Fever' (probably a type of malaria)

During Napoelon's Russian Campaign of 1812, the summer was particularly hot, and clean water was scarce resulting in a very high incidence of typhiod, dysentry, and enteric fever. In the first five weeks of the 1812 campaign Napoleon lost over one third of his army to disease alone, and the recent discovered of a grave pit in Germany contained over 1,200 bodies all of which had died from disease.

In 1813 Napoleons new army contained a large number of young conscripts who were particularly susceptible to infection and by his own estimates he lost over 219,000 men during the Liepzig campaign to disease.

Source: 'The Art of Warfare in the Age of Napoleon' by Rothenburg. pages 236-237

As an interesting aside, more men from the Light Brigade in the Crimeria died from disease after the battle of balaclava than actuallly died in the charge on the Russian guns.

As far as combat casualties were concerned my understanding was that based on analysis conducted at the time the majority of casulties were caused by artillery fire, followed by musketry, then cold steel, and practically non-existent were bayonet casualties. However, I've not found anywhere that actually quotes the figures, although I'm pretty sure it was a French study.

I thought it was Roy Muirs book but having mislaid it temporarily I shall bow to Cholera's testimony that Muir is using figures from 1762 and the American Civil War. [p.s. Found it and yes Cholera is correct]

[emperorpenguin]

As far as combat casualties were concerned my understanding was that based on analysis conducted at the time the majority of casulties were caused by artillery fire, followed by musketry, then cold steel, and practically non-existent were bayonet casualties. However, I've not found anywhere that actually quotes the figures, although I'm pretty sure it was a French study.

I thought it was Roy Muirs book but having mislaid it temporarily I shall bow to Cholera's testimony that Muir is using figures from 1762 and the American Civil War. [p.s. Found it and yes Cholera is correct]

Skuffy gave the details earlier on this page

Duffy, Christopher. The Military Experience in the Age of Reason. Hertfordshire: Wordsworth. 1998.
First published, London: Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd. 1987

pages 245-6

Quote:
It is impossible to establish exactly what proportions of casualties were inflicted by the various weapons. The most convincing evidence appears at first sight to come from records like those of the Invalides in Paris, which detail the admissions for 1762 as follows:

68.8% wounded by small arms

13.4% wounded by artillery

14.7% wounded by swords

2.4% wounded by bayonets

(Corvisier, 1964, 65)

However, these were by definition survivable wounds. The proportion of casualties inflicted by the sword is greatly exaggerated as a result, just as the effect of artillery is very much understated.

There is also Larrey's study which found ~2% of wounds were caused by bayonets.

The Crimean figures for British wounded which I have show 76 bayonet wounds, 87 sword or lance wounds and 10038 gunshot wounds. Officers figures show 10 bayonet wounds out of 579.

[Didz]

Skuffy gave the details earlier on this page

Skuffy also makes a very valid point that as these figures are based upon wounds being treated, they actually ignore the fatalities, which probably throws the figures off quite a bit.

BTW: Do, you have a reference for Larry's study, I was trying to find it earlier. I know he did one but haven't mananged to turn it up so far?

[emperorpenguin]

Skuffy also makes a very valid point that as these figures are based upon wounds being treated, they actually ignore the fatalities, which probably throws the figures off quite a bit.

BTW: Do, you have a reference for Larry's study, I was trying to find it earlier. I know he did one but haven't mananged to turn it up so far?

Yes that is true. You'd excpect few artillery wounds to be survivable.
Apparently they just didn't bother/have time to do a studyof the wounds of the dead. This was in an era where bodies were tossed into mass graves - quickly.

I'll check on Larrey.

[Didz]

I'll check on Larrey.

I'd be grateful. I keep finding references to the Larry study, such as the discussion with Napoleon about the high incidence of elbow injuries amongst new recruits, but so far have never managed to find the actual figures from the study itself.

Even so as we have already said these figures were based upon Larry's notes from his classification of wounds, and ignores fatalities and wounded that never made it to triage.

For what its worth in all the wargame campaigns I've fought (where casualties were divided into A) Artillery, B) Musketry and C) Melee for recovery purposes) we found the largest body count always fell to the artillery. Not historical evidence of course, but the simple fact is that units start taking casualties from artillery virtually as soon as a battle opens and the body count continues steadily from beginning to end, whereas musketry and cold steel inflict high numbers of casualties but for limited amounts of time.

[Skuffy9790]

Skuffy also makes a very valid point that as these figures are based upon wounds being treated, they actually ignore the fatalities, which probably throws the figures off quite a bit.

Yes most certainly. We much imagine that if a man's head was blown off by a 6 pound ball he'd never make it further than a mass grave if he was lucky. Also the poor bastards that had, say, both legs blown off would most likely be left to die on the field