The evening times., 1899-08-18
VALUE OF GOOD MARCHING.
a Fast Moving Army Has Grea,
s.,- -oeE Advantage.
(From DC Contemporary Review.l


(From the Contemporary Review
Among the Various Qualities that go to
make an army powerful and efficient, the
speed of the foot-soldier must evidently
be onegof the most important. If he be
slow OF movement he becomes but the
target of more active foe, even though
armed with more. efficient weapons. The
speed Of any body of men must be the
speed of the slowest Of their number and
the force that can uniformly depend on
travelling even little faster than the
enemy has material advantage. No Eng
lish regiments have ever been scientific
ally trained TO accomplish the feats OF long
and rapid marching of which there are
authentic records in two or three Europ-
can armies. There can be no doubt that
one of the chief factors in the success OF
Sir Herbert Kitchener's brilliant campaign
has been the excellent marching OF the
! troops. Any experiments, therefore, that
are being made fer definite increase in
the speed TO which the soldier can be
trained are worthy OF study.
The writer shows that by special train
ing men acquired speed in marching, and
by that means became more efficient as SOL
diers. a body, of reserve artillerymen,
who were no longer young, after a course
OF eighteen lessons marched five miles in
forty-six minutes, With their arms only,
and two and one-half miles in twenty-six
minutes with full equipment. number
OF cases are quoted where, after a few les
sons, soldiers were able to cover long dis
tances in remarkably short time, and the
value OF this Improvement seems to be
generally admitted by all students of the
subject.
Col. W. H. Powell, who is stationed at
Governors Island, said that the value OF
in
country, as we'll as it is abroad, and espe-
cially by officers who have seen service
on the Western frontier.
With practice he said much time
can be saved in marching, and l have seen
men do in an hour what would ordinarily
have taken two hours. But the speed de-
pends so much on the climate and the
condition OF the country that it is hard
to lay down any fixed schedule But this
We know-that by marching an hour and
resting ten minutes body of men of the
ordinary kind can keep going at the rate
Of three miles an hour all day.
1t was explained that the length of the
ordinary step in the United States Army
is thirty inches, measured from heel to
heel, and the cadence is at the rate of one
hundred and twenty steps minute This
was formerly ninety steps of twenty eight
inches to the minute. The length of the
full step in double time is thirty-six
inches, and the cadence is at the rate of
one hundred and eighty steps a minute.
Rapid movement is spoken of by the Eng
lish writer as of prime Importance in
field maneuvres, and more so today than
ever; the time is gone by when heavy
troops, composed the main body of an
army; the lesson of all recent campaigns
Is tnat great CELEBRITY of movement is in
dispensable.'
The English writer says, and many Amer
lean officers agree with him, that the high
stepping soldier is as little suited for long
marches as the housekeeping horse for q
race. To march effectively is one thing. to
look pretty" another. The knees must
always be bent" says the writer, "the feet
lifted no higher than necessary to clear
the inequalities of the ground; the advanc-
ing foot must be placed fiat on the ground
the step being made neither by the toe nor
by the heel. The football should be noise
less, and the steps at first short and fire.
quent. The body must lean well forward,
the back must be straight and the head
erect. the chest open and shoulders low"
Men who served in the last war; said a
member of the National Guard, "soon learn
ed that the armory step was of little use
in the field. The one was all right enough
in its place, and even in the streets of New
York; but in the field where men want
to keep their strength as much as possi-
BILE. they soon learned that a bent knee
and toes straight ahead were better than
the stiff leg and toes out. The 'get-there'
step is what We called it.
Edmund Verney says of the upright pos
ture:
in every country may be observed a
marked difference between the ordinary
gait of the rich and of the poor; in London
may be seen the siouching of the unemploy-
cd hxy ho n tha 90 rrio Oo Nf ho
prosperous merchant In African tribes
the humble bearing of the slave contrasts
with the naughty stride of the chief. 1t is
this upright posture that is admired and
taught to the soldier, but it is the one that
demands the greatest expenditure Of physi-
cal energy, and is the worst adapted for
prolonged effort"