The Charleston daily news. [volume] (Charleston, S.C.) 1865-1873, 1866-11-07
COST OF WAR IN THE EIGITEENTI,
AND NINETEENTH CENTURIES.

The Pal AfaH Gazette has the following obser-
vations:
An exhaustive comparison Of the cost of war
now and formerly would be most instructive and
impossible to draw Out such contrast with com
plete accuracy, but it might be done approximate
~: The expensveness Of war to country COM
prises many items; the size Of armies and navies;
the cost OF transport; the price of arms and am
munition,i the slaughter directly or indirectly
caused the extent and complication Of the fortif-
and civilization Of the district which is the seat of
war. Some OF these can be ascertained or esti-
mated others can only be guessed St Thus the
is incomparaby more costly to both parties than
the siege Of fortress like Namur. A campaign
in England, or in the heart Of France or Germany
as compared with campaign carried on in Russin,
In Poland, or even in Spain would be costlier be-
yond all measure OF comparison, both in reference
cate and complex processes of civilized and indus
trial life suspended or deranged. In wild and
thinly peopled lands war may cost nothing but
far advanced in all the luxurious appliances of
modern existence its expense becomes actually in
A few facts may, however, be noted down by
which something, not of an estimate, but Of IN
idea may be arrived at as to tho vastly increased
cost of warfare now and in the days OF fathers
and grandfathers. One point Of comparison is
that tho armies we fight with are enormously
greater than they used to be- This is owing in
part to our improved facilities for the transport
Of troops, materials and tho commissarat Rail
wa ways do nov, nov, and do far moro rapidly and cheap
se a ana n the the Duke Of g In the
battles OF tho Seven Years. War, the Prussians
never had moro than seventy Thousand mon in
only two or three cases did the aggregate Of the
combatants on both sides reach one hundred thou
sand. Evon in tho early battles of Napoleon tho
cred small. Before Wagram he never had moro
than one hundred thousand men in tho field, and
seldom nearly rs many. At Marengo ho had not
downfall approached that he began to deal with
corps ddrnee as numerous and colossal as those
with which the wars Of our days are making us
familiar. At Borodino and Dresden quarter OF a
million were engaged, and at Loipsio, If figures can
be trusted, not far from half million. The British
force force with which our great Duke the PENN
not more than once-reachod fifty thousand and
his entire army, oven reckoning Spaniards and
Portuguese, seldom much exceeded That number
At the crowning victory of Waterloo the forces
on botE ides wore under one hundred and forty
thousal and Of theso not one third were English
thousand who fought at Solferino the four hum
dred and twenty thousand at Sadowa, and the
multitudes often exceeding quarter of million,
with which the Americans triod the terrible Issues
Of their civil controversy, and tho advance made
in recent times, II it bo an advance, will bo obgi
GUS at once.
our days, in spite Of our mighter artillery and
a,nes do precision, is not propoTtoned to the num-
Dor engaged. Why this should be go we arc not
prepared to say, and we are aware that the popu-
lar impression is O different ono, but we believe
tho facts would be found to boar us out. In Fred
ericks wars the proportion Of killed and wounded
on both sides to the forces in tho field ranged from
o1e;sixth on to ono-tenth and at the peculiar battle
or Zornsdorf far exceeded this ratio. In Napo-
Icons campaigns it still higher often averaging
o fifth; while ut Eyau and Borodino it is said to
nave reached third. In some OF these cases.
perhaps, the missing" may have been included
but not usually. Alison's calculation is that from
1892 to 1915 thrce millions of French soldiers per-
ished in tho field or in tho hospital and at least an
equal number ont Of tho ranks OF their antago-
nists. The proportion Of The slain aud disabled in
the American battles is not known with any accu-
racy, but probably no ono would place it higher
than onetenth; whilo in tho italian battles of 1859
1T s estimated at scarcely moro than a twelfth nnd
Mt Sadowa about o fifteenth. Still, thouph the
proportion ia less than it used to bo the positiye
number who fall is even greater, and the cost in
life therefore heavier. '' -'
If VIC compare the cost of the arms and artillery
now in uHo, and their suitable ammunition, with
tho ruder and cheaper weapons which contentcd
us in IN the last war, some of tho figures arc vory
startling: The old calculation for o man. of-war
used to DO roughly f1000 per gun; a three-decker
CO.'S. tntretore, fI06,L0L CT IZG00t. n IL it-raee
iron-plated vessel cannot, we pollove. bo complot-
ed under half million, and somo of our cxpori-
mental ships arc understood to have cost nearly