The Vermont watchman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1883-1911, 1899-07-19
MODERN FIELD ARTILLERY.
Guus Nowadays Capable Of Firing Eighteen
and Twenty shots an Hour.

Guus Nowadays Capable Of Firing Eighteen
and Twenty shots AN Hour.
Field artillery has passed through
complete evolution during the last few
years. Increase in rapidity of firing
has become an essential condition OF
the existence of the modern fleld-piece.
All military authorities agree upon the
necessity OF being able to produce at
given moment terrible effects in the
shortest possible time. The difficulty
in the problem consisted in avoiding
o waste Of munitions.
Upon this subject Lieut.. Poncet has
published in the Revue d'Artillerie"
an interesting article which has been
partially inspired by the works Of Gen.
Langlois upon field artillery. Up to the
end of the sixteenth century little at
tentlon had been paid to rapid firing.
The artillery, moreover, was heavy and
clumsy. At the battle of Granson. in
1475, according to Meyer in his Tech
nology of Firearms" the pieces of
Charles the Bold were charged and
pointed against the Swiss at the begin
ming of the combat. The firing began
in volleys, but the aim was too high,
and this caused the loss of the battle,
because there was no time to recharge
the pieces. At that period the average
artillery fire was about thirty shots
a day for each piece The heating of
the pieces also proved to be an obstacle.
Attempts at increasing the rapidity
OF artillery fire go back as far as the
seventeenth century, when the Ger
mans employed the first breech-loading
cannon. More serious results were OBJ
tanned in the time of Frederick H..
when the field artillery was made very
much lighter. Up to the end of the
eighteenth century, with the return Of
the heavy pieces of artillery of Gre
beauval, as well as in the wars of the
revolution and of the empire the maxi
mum rapidity of the fire in battle was
from one to two shots a minute for
each piece.
Moreover, in the time of smooth bore
guns, the cannonade which preceded
the battle was never intended to crush
the enemy. 1t covered the deploying of
the troops and presented a chance to
gain time without serious loss to the
enemy. During the greater portion of the
action the artillery fire was almost con-
tinuous, but always extremely slow.
AT the decisive moment, marked by the
employment of shrapnel or grapeshot.
the artillery discharges were carried
on with extraordinary violence. and
reached a rapidly of 21a and even
shots minute for each piece, as. for
instance, at Wagram and Friedland.
when the batteries opened the breach
for the infantry by their grape and
canister fire
With rifed cannon the action was
rarely decisive at long range. At an
ordinary distance the effect produced
was satisfactory, but it was never
crushing. For example at Sadowa,
two lines of artillery fought for five
hours without either being knocked
out. During the Franco German war
the rapidity of fire of the French guns
reached one shot a minute with the
12-pound pieces and two shots minute
with the 3 and pound pieces, and the
same for shrapnel fire. The rapidity
OF the German breech-loading guns was
very little superior to that of the
French
Since 1871 the progress of field artil-
lery has been considerably increased,
In the first advance the range w in
creased. In the second the destrL, i've
power of the projectile was developed
by methodical augmentation and in
the third and last step this same power
has been augmented still more by the
general use of the tir fusant, which ex-
tends by 500 to 5000 metres, and even
more, the crushing effects of the old
shrapnel fire.
1t is undeniable that to crush an en-
envy 1t is only necessary to increase the
offensive power of artillery fire, and to
do that the maximum OF rapidity is
required. Artillery" says Gen. Lam
glois, by its fire ought to be just like
an Old-time charge of cavalry with
this difference, that it is charge
that nothing can stop and which
smashes down everything before it,"
The means employed to that end
consist in diminis. the recoil, in
accelerating the return of the piece in
ha 4 aa.. L.. 4. L.