In the fourteenth century gunpowder and fire-arms became 
known in Western and Central Europe and every schoolchild 
knows that these purely technical advances wholly revolutionised 
methods of warfare. But this revolution proceeded at a very slow 
pace. The first fire-arms were very crude, particularly the 
arquebus. And although a great number of separate improve- 
ments were invented at an early date—the rifled barrel, the 
breech-loader, the wheel-lock, etc.—still it took over three 
hundred years before, at the end of the seventeenth century, a 
musket was constructed suitable for equipping the entire body of 
infantry. 

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries the foot-soldiery 
consisted partly of pikemen and partly of arquebusiers. Originally 
the pike carriers’ task was to effect a decision by charging the 
enemy, while the arquebus fire served the purposes of defence. 
The pikemen therefore fought in compact masses many ranks 
deep, like in the ancient Greek phalanx; the arquebusiers stood in 
formations eight to ten ranks in depth, because that many could 
fire in succession before one could load. Anyone whose weapon 
was loaded jumped in front, fired and withdrew to the last rank in 
order to load again. 

The gradual perfection of fire-arms changed this relation. The 
matchlock musket could finally be loaded so rapidly that only five 
men, i.e., troops only five men deep, were required to maintain 
continuous fire. Thus the same number of musketeers could now 
hold a front almost twice as long as before. Because of the much 
more devastating effect of gun-fire on mass formations many men 

deep the pikemen too were now drawn up in only six to eight 
ranks, so that the battle order gradually approximated the line 
formation, in which musket fire decided the issue and the 
pikemen were no longer kept for the attack but only as cover for 
the sharpshooters against mounted troops. At the end of this 
period we find a battle array consisting of two combat detach- 
ments and a reserve, each detachment drawn up in line, mostly six 
men deep, guns and horsemen partly in the intervals between 
battalions, partly at the wings; each infantry battalion consisted at 
the most of one-third pikemen and at least of two-thirds 
musketeers. 

At the end of the seventeenth century the flint-lock musket with 
a bayonet and ready-made cartridges was at last produced. With 
this the pike disappeared once and for all from infantry service. 
Loading took less and less time, the more rapid fire was itself a 
protection and the bayonet replaced the pike in case of necessity. 
Thus the depth of the line could be reduced from six to four, 
later to three and finally here and there to two ranks. Hence the 
line lengthened steadily with the same number of men, and ever 
more muskets were in use simultaneously. But these long, thin 
lines became thereby also more and more unwieldy and could 
move in formation only on level, unobstructed ground, and even 
then only very slowly, 70-75 paces a minute; and it was just in a 
plain that the line, in particular its flanks, offered the enemy 
cavalry prospects of successful attack. Partly to protect these flanks 
and partly to strengthen the fighting line, which decided the day, 
the cavalry was totally massed on the wings so that the battle line 
proper consisted solely of footmen and their light battalion guns. 
The extremely unwieldy heavy guns were mounted in front of the 
wings and changed position at the most only once during a battle. 
The foot-soldiers were drawn up in two detachments whose flanks 
were covered by infantry drawn up at an angle, the whole array 
forming a single very long hollow rectangle. This cumbrous mass, 
when it was not to move as a whole, could only be divided into 
three parts, the centre and the two wings. This shifting of parts 
was confined to moving up the wing numerically superior to the 
enemy’s in order to outflank him, while the other wing was held 
back as a menace, to prevent him from re-arranging his front 
accordingly. A complete change in the dislocation of troops during 
a battle consumed so much time and exposed so many weak spots 
to the enemy that the attempt almost always ended in defeat. The 
original array therefore governed throughout the battle and as 
soon as the footmen joined battle one crushing blow decided the 

day. This entire method of warfare, developed to the highest pitch 
by Frederick II, was the inevitable result of two jointly operating 
material factors: first, the human material of that time, the 
mercenary armies of princes, rigorously drilled but quite unreli- 
able and only held together by the rod, many of them hostile 
prisoners of war who had been pressed into service; and second, 
the armament—the cumbersome heavy guns and the smoothbore 
rapid but badly firing flint-lock muskets with bayonets. 

This method of combat prevailed as long as both adversaries 
remained on the same level with regard to manpower and 
armament and it suited both to adhere to the prescribed rules. But 
when the American War of Independence* broke out the 
well-drilled mercenary troops were unexpectedly met by hordes of 
rebels who, while not knowing how to exercise, were splendid 
shots who for the most part carried accurate rifles and fought in 
their own cause, hence did not desert. These rebels did not do the 
English troops the favour of dancing with them the well-known 
battle minuet, stepping slowly across open plain, observing all the 
traditional rules of military etiquette. They drew their opponent 
into dense forests, where his long columns in marching order 
were, without the possibility of defence, exposed to the fire of 
scattered invisible skirmishers. Operating in loose order they took 
advantage of every bit of cover the terrain afforded to harass the 
enemy, maintaining at the same time great mobility that could 
never be matched by the cumbersome mass of the enemy troops. 
The combat fire of scattered skirmishers, which had been of 
importance as early as the introduction of the portable fire-arm, 
proved therefore superior here, in certain cases, particularly in 
small encounters, to the linear formation. 

The soldiers that composed the mercenary troops of Europe 
were not suitable for fighting in loose order; their armament was 
still less so. True, the musket was no longer pressed against the 
chest on firing, as had been necessary with the old matchlocks; the 
musket was brought up to the shoulder, as now. But there could 
still be no question of aiming, since with a perfectly straight stock 
continuing the line of the barrel the eye could not freely run 
down the latter. It was only in 1777 that in France the slanting of 
the butt characteristic of the hunting rifle was also adopted for the 
infantry rifle and effective tirailleur fire made possible. A second 
improvement to be mentioned was the lighter but still solid 
gun-carriage constructed in the middle of the eighteenth century 
by Gribeauval, which alone made possible the greater mobility 
later demanded of artillery. 

It was reserved to the French Revolution * to utilise these two 

technical improvements on the field of battle. When allied Europe 
attacked it it placed at the disposal of the government all the 
members of the nation capable of bearing arms. But this nation 
had no time to practise the intricate manoeuvres of linear tactics 
sufficiently to be able to oppose the veteran Prussian and Austrian 
infantry in similar formation. On the other hand, France lacked 
not only the primeval forests of America but also its virtually 
boundless territory for retreat. What was needed was to defeat the 
enemy between the frontier and Paris, that is, to defend a definite 
area, and that in the long run could be done only in open mass 
battle. Consequently it became necessary to find, in addition to the 
skirmish chains, still another form in which the ‘badly drilled 
French masses could face Europe’s standing armies with some 
prospect of success. This form was found in the close column, 
which was already being used in certain cases, but mostly on 
parade grounds. The column was easier to keep in order than the 
line. Even when thrown somewhat into disarray its compact mass 
nevertheless continued to offer at least passive resistance. The 
column was easier to handle, was more under the direct control of 
the commander and could move faster. Its speed rose to 100 paces 
and more a minute. But the most important result consisted in the 
following: the use of the column as the exclusive mass battle 
formation made it possible to divide up the cumbrous uniform 
whole of the old linear order of battle into separate parts, each 
granted a certain degree of independence, each adapting its 
general instructions to the circumstances confronted, and each 
composed, if so desired, of all three arms of the service. The 
column was plastic enough to permit of every possible combination 
of troop employment; it allowed the use of villages and 
farm-houses, which Frederick II had_ still strictly forbidden; 
henceforth they became the main points of support in every battle. 
The column could be employed in any terrain; and finally it could 
counter linear tactics—where all was staked on one card—with 
combat tactics in which the line was fatigued and so worn down by 
skirmish chains and the gradual use of troops to protract the 
engagement that it could not withstand the thrust of the fresh 
fighters that had been kept in reserve to the very end. Whereas 
the linear formation was equally strong at all points, an adversary 
fighting in close column formation could keep part of the line 
engaged by feint attacks of small bodies of troops and concentrate 
his main force for the assault on the key position.— Loose bodies 
of skirmishers now did most of the firing while the columns 

attacked with the bayonet. This restored the similar relation that 
had existed between the skirmish chains and the mass of pikemen 
at the beginning of the sixteenth century, with the exception, 
however, that the modern columns could at any time disperse 
to form skirmish chains and the latter again mass to form col- 
umns. 

This new method of combat, the use of which Napoleon 
developed to the acme of perfection, was so superior to the old 
that the latter hopelessly collapsed when faced by it, the last time 
being at Jena,’ where the cumbersome, slow moving Prussian 
lines, largely useless for skirmishing, virtually melted away when 
the French tirailleurs poured in their fire, to which they could 
reply only with platoon fire. But even if the linear battle order 
succumbed, this was by no means true of the line as combat 
formation. A few years after the Prussians had made out so badly 
with their lines at Jena, Wellington led his English troops in line 
formation against the French columns and as a rule beat them. 
But Wellington, to be sure, had adopted the whole of French 
tactics, with the exception that he had his close-formation infantry 
fight in line, and not in column formation. He thus secured the 
- advantage of bringing into simultaneous action, when firing, all his 
rifles, and when attacking, all his bayonets. In this battle array the 
English fought up to a few years ago and got the best of the 
bargain both in attack (Albuera) and defence (Inkerman) even 
when considerably outnumbered. Until his death, Bugeaud, who 
had faced those English lines, preferred them to the column. 

Moreover, the infantry fire-arm was extremely bad, so bad that 
at a hundred paces it could hit a person standing alone only 
seldom and at three hundred paces a whole battalion just as 
seldom. Thus, when the French came to Algiers they suffered 
heavy losses from the Bedouins’ long firelock muskets fired at 
distances at which their own muskets scored no hits. Here only the 
rifled musket could be of any use. But it was precisely in France 
that the rifle, even as an emergency weapon, had always been 
objected to, because it took so long to load and clogged so quickly. 
But now when the need for an easily loaded musket made itself 
felt it was met at once. The preparatory work of Delvigne was 
followed by Thouvenin’s tige-rifle and Minié’s expansive bullets, 
the latter having placed the rifled and the smoothbore musket on 
an absolute par with regard to loading time, so that now the entire 
infantry could be equipped with accurate long-range rifles. But 
before the rifled muzzle-loader could establish the tactics suitable 
to its use it was supplanted by the most up-to-date weapon, the 

rifled breech-loader, while at the same time rifled ordnance 
developed ever increasing efficiency. 

The arming of the entire nation, which the revolution had 
ushered in, soon experienced considerable restriction. Only part of 
the young people liable to military service were called up, by lot, 
into the standing army and a greater or smaller part of the rest of 
the citizens were, at most, formed into an untrained National 
Guard. Or, in those countries where universal conscription was 
really strictly enforced, as in Switzerland, at most a militia was 
formed which was drilled under the colours for no more than a 
few weeks. Financial considerations made necessary the choice 
between conscription and militia. Only one country in Europe, and 
at that one of the poorest, attempted to combine universal 
conscription and standing army. That was Prussia. And even 
though the universal obligation to serve in the standing army was 
enforced only approximately, also necessitated by financial consid- 
erations, the Prussian Landwehr**’ system nevertheless placed at 
the disposal of the government such a considerable number of 
trained people organised in ready cadres that Prussia was 
decidedly superior to any other country of equal population. 

In the Franco-German War of 1870 the French conscription 
system succumbed to the Prussian Landwehr system. In this war, 
however, both sides were for the first time equipped with 
breech-loading rifles, while the regulations for moving and 
fighting remained essentially the same as at the time of the old 
flint-locks. At most the ttrailleur chains were somewhat more 
compact. As for the rest, the French still fought in the old 
battalion column formation, at times also in line formation, while 
on the German side at least an attempt was made, in the 
introduction of the company column formation, to find a form of 
fighting which was better adapted to the new type of arms. Thus 
one managed in the first few battles. But when, in the storming 
of St. Privat (August 18), three brigades of the Prussian Guard 
tried to apply the company column formation seriously, the 
devastating power of the breech-loaders became apparent. Of the 
five chiefly engaged regiments (15,000 men) almost all officers 
(176) and 5,114 men, that is, upwards of one-third, fell. The 
Guard Infantry alone, whose strength had been 28,160 men when 
it joined the fray, lost 8,230 men including 307 officers that day.*** 
From that time on the company column as a battle formation was 
condemned no less than the battalion mass formation or the line. 
All idea of further exposing troops in any kind of close formation 
to enemy rifle fire was abandoned; on the German side all 

subsequent fighting was conducted only in those compact chains of 
tiratlleurs into which the columns had so far regularly dispersed of 
themselves under a deadly hail of bullets, although this had been 
opposed by the higher commands on the ground that it was 
contrary to good battle formation. Once again the soldier had 
been shrewder than the officer; it was he who instinctively found 
the only way of fighting which has proved of service up to now 
under the fire of breech-loading rifles, and in spite of opposition 
from his officers he carried it through successfully. Likewise the 
double was the only step now used within the range of the frightful 
rifle fire.