The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1900-01-08
GOLD STEEL" IN WAR.
BAYoNET AGAIN IN FAVOR AMONG
MILITARY EXPERTS.

It's Use by the British Ia South Afri-
cn-What Recent History shows.
The Invention. Rise and VicIssI-
tudes of the Bayonct.
From the New York Tribune
There are signs in the news from the
seat OF war in South Africa that the
British bayouet" is not yet by any means
past its deadly usefulness Al Mafekiug,
the dispatches say, one night attack upon
the besiegers' trenches, delivering dose
of cold steer when darkness prevented
the Boer rihemen from shooting with good
effect was of the greatest service in pre-
venting a close advance of the parallels.
There is a story. too. which is probably
mythical in itself, but equally probably
based on general facts, that in an attack
on trenches somewhere near the scene OF
Buffers recent defeat a cry of Fix bay
onets and give them the cold steelp had
more effect upon the defending party than
many rounds of Lee-Metford ammunition
would have had If the Beers, brave
enough as everybody admits. in what
Kentuckians call Shooting scrape," fight
shy of the bayonet, It is all the less to
be wondered at. as they themselves APP
pear to be unprovded with any such wea-
pom, and are certainly not as the British
infantryman is, trained to It's use.
Since the Crimean War the opinion that
the bayonet has had It's day has gIned
ground. Considering the enormous in
crease in the range and power of rifles
since that time, ii is rather wonderful that
any one should think otherwise. But his
tory has been far from unanimous on
this point; in fact 1t has been self-con-
Trajectory, just as 1t has been in the mat
ter of the saber for the cavalryman There
must have been little or nothing, for in
stance, in the scene at the Turkish trench 3
before PleVna TO remind the war CORE
spondents who watched and recorded IL
that this was not battle of the old he
roic man-to-man period. These correspon-
dents told how, as the victorious Russian
infantry approached the works, firing and
receiving the Turkish fire n long line Of
red capped loose trousered demons sprang
up from within the breastworks, and,
whirlng their rifles aloft. with a yell OF
allah IL Allah!' came down on the Mus
covites at the old-fashoned charge"
1t was the officers who made the surren-
der of Plevna a decent modern affair;
the Turkish rank and file could, and would
without doubt, have gone on at their work
of point and butt until none were left TO
surrender to the surviving victorious Rus
SLAMS but the staff
SO much for the Turk. But about two
years later history had an entirely differ
ent tale to tell The tale of Majuba HIN
goes that a battalion of British infantry
wearing the uniform of the same regiment
which included the "Minden Yell" among
its Traditions, was beaten off by a banl
or Dutch farmers and utterly destroyed.
because the crack British regiment trust
.aI 10. afr ha he far ebn
from behind rocks.
The BayOnct in Infantry Fighting.
And yet If the efficacy of the bayonet
had been on trial before a jury of experts
il would certainly have been considered 10
have had every advantage in being put
into the hands of British soldiers. The
history of infantry lighting sums up some
thing like this: First, the Macedonian
phalanx with long lances; then the RO-
man legion, with short, stout spears; then
an interval, say, of twelve centuries dur
ing most of which the mounted man had
things all his own way; then the 200 years
beginning about 1850, when the Spanish
"infanteria" was considered irresistible
by reason of its pixies, which were practi-
cally the Roma ''pila" then the introduce
ton of the Matchbox and with It
threat of an end to all CLOSE quarters" as
early as the beginning of the sixteenth
century.
But some French or Spanish soldier
whose name has been fost to fame hit
upon the brilliant idea that these newfan-
gled machines might be converted into
honest pixies occasionally by simply stick
ing the butt of a dagger into the muzzle
Of the matchbox. This scheme seemed to
work well for half a century, until 1t was
generally felt that II the firing of
matchbox was to become other than
long and deliberate ceremonial, as seemed
IL kF 10
that were coming from Nuremberg, the
corking and uncorking of the barrels
would have to be obvated in some way
or other.
In 1889 Gen. Mackay introduced among
his infantry the ring bayonet. The name
OF the weapon has been connected with
Payonne, the French seaport. As a matter
Of fact. "bayona" and "bayoneta" are
Spanish words, and mean neither more
nor less than "sticker" and little stick
err" But the etymology of the word did
not trouble the British and Irish infantry
whom IL helped TO raise to the topmost
place among the troops Of Europe in the
period from 1703-the date when Waupan
introduced the socketed bayonet in the
armies of the Great Monarch-to the mid
die of the present century. The transition
from ring to socket was "A perfectly natu-
raj one The two rings in the earlier wea-
pom were merged into sort OF tube fitting
on the end of the musket barrel The
blade was connected with this tube by a
stout neck, 50 as to leave 1t clear of the
bullets path when the gun was dis
charged In order to give the blade great
err strength il was made triangular in
section. Finally this triangular blade was
followed out, to make it as light as posi-
bic and so reduce to a minimum its disad-
vantage as a weight at the end Of the
piece in firing.
British BnyOnets To-day.
Thus was evolved the form of bayonet
which is to this day the conventional
idea of 1t entertained by uniformed civil