The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1896-08-30
LOSS OF HORSES IN WAR.
Napoleon Enters Russia with 10000
Cavalry Horses and Returned With
Lon the PaH Man Gazette.

1000.
From the Pail Mall Gazette.
During the Prussian campaign in BOhe-
mia the killed and wounded amounted to
less than 800, while 400 died of exhaustion
and disease. and over LOO we're cast after
the campaign. At the beginning Of the
siege Of Plevna the Russians had 5000
draught horses bringing up supplies from
SistOva, and at the end of it they had
only 44.0OO, the enormous number Of 22OOO
having died from hard work. The Difficult
~ Of providing food is naturally very
great, and horses feel the deprivation. as
we'll as want of rest. far more than men.
They have very little reserve of fat to
draw upon, and they have not the moral
stimulus Of the soldiers. When Murat re-
preached Nansouty for the spiriue ssness
Of his cavalry charges, that general with
~ replied that it was due to the horses
want of patriotism. The men might fight
without bread, but the horses would not
work without oats. So excessive is the ex-
haustion sometimes. that towards the
close of the day at BorOdintO the French
charged at a SLOW trOt. Half the horses
that we landed in the Crimea never re-
turned, and most OF them owed their death
to exhaustion and starvation. Five hun
fire; 1000 died of want and disease. They
fed on each Others tails. and ate the bot
toms of carts and the spokes of wheels.
During WellingtOn's arduOus retreat
from Salamanca the only food Of the
horses was twigs and the bark Of trees.
In our Afghan war in 1888 owing to the
scarcity of food, 5000 camels and % per
cent. Of the cavalry horses were lost in
three months. Napoleon crossed the Me
men on his way to the assault on Russia
with $1,000 cavalry, and recrossed it, six
months later, with 1,600l He attributed
his losses to the cold, but starvation had
more to do with them. One can imagine
the great warmaker crying, "Oh, for an
automOter that does not require oatsr'
Starvation and fatigue are especially de-
structtve in retreats. Even if there is
food to give there is no time to give it.
While retreating from Portugal, Massena
lost more horses from starvation and ia
tigue in ten days than he had lost in the
preceding five months campaign. Di-
sease disables at least twelve per cent
Of the horses engaged in a campaign. and
sometimes much more. As many as for
ty per cent were invalided at one time
in the Crimea. OF the 5000 horses that we
landed in Egypt in 1882 over $500 came
under veterinary treatment, and 900 were
killed, SO only being slain in action. One
regiment is said to have had 200 horses on
the sick list simultaneously.
Our cavalryman. by the way, has not a
very good reputation for the care of his
steed-or rather had not. Field Marshal
Sir J. Burgoyne said that the German
cavalryman was so much more careful of
his horse than the Englishman that, in
the Peninsular campaign, although they
both had the same horses and provender,
the German could put 100 horses in the
ranks for the Englishman's ten And Mer-
Ger, in his Diary Of. the Waterloo cam
*
of himself until his horse is provided for;
the Englishman looks on his horse as a
nuisance and source of perpetual drudg-
cry" This gentleman, indeed, goes so
far as to assert that, while the German
would sell his clothes to feed his horse
the Englishman would sell his house to
buy spirits and tobacco. Probab bly, things
have changed since then.
There are other avoidable causes of
great loss. Sore backs from ill-ftting sad
dies and too heavy burdens were so IRE.
quent that at Waterloo there were squad
rons which did not possess a single sound
horse in the ranks. Defective shooting is
another great, and generally avoidable
evil. Armies have been paralyzed from
this cause. Mcclellan says that in the
American civil war the horses feet were
in a deplorable state, and soldiers wera
often seen leading limping horses, with
the feet of a dead horse hanging from
Lne Sduule-cut OH IOr the sake of the
shoes. In the Franco-German campaign
the roads were often as smooth as glass:
cavalry had to dismount, and artillery
horses fell at every step, owing to the
want of the means of roughing the shoes
Then there is that curious and annoying
mishap, the stampede, a common occur
renee in all expeditions. The most trivial
cause sends off a whole regiment. On the
night before the battle of Salamanca a
severe thunder storm caused the STAN
pede Of an imense number of horses. and |
every man, from the general down, was
engaged all night till just before the en-
gagement trying to capture the runaways.
Lastly-and very important point it 8
for us-the loss of horses during a sea
voyage is often very great. If the weather
is fine and hot they are suffocated; if it
is rough they are tossed about and hud-
died in heaps, biting and kicking each
other and being battered to death. The
Chelsea commission ELECTED from Lord
Lucan the fact that in the passage from
Varna to Balaclava the Heavy Brigade |
lost go troop horses, and a regiment go |
ing from England to Portugal during the /
peninsular campaign was deprived of ex-
actly half its mounts on the VOYAGE