Eagle River review. [volume] (Eagle River, Wis.) 1890-1927, 1912-05-03
MODERN WARFARE
LESS MURDEROUS,

There are not wanting authoritoI
with reference to things military WI
aver that the improvement in orH
has actually rendered warfare ~
destructive, and that in these DAYS u
fearful engines of war the slangbtO1
is much less than it was in the ",
days of muskets, of bows and arrow
and Of hand to hand conflicts. In al
dition, it may be pointed out tbo
the modern wars have been mercifulI
~ shorter, and so less sanguiusrv
than those of the centuries gone
Under the primitive conditions q
fighting, when gunpowder was mi
known, wars drifted on for genera
lions, even for centuries. Engla6S|
waged war with Scotland almo,t
without intermission for a hundred
years, and for a like period with
France. The Thirty Years war and
later, the Seven Years war, ard
epochs in military history.
Our own Civil war, though fougSt
with muzzle-loading guns, lasted bud
four years. About a year thereafter
Prussia overcame Austria in seven
short weeks, and in 1871 the German
power overwhelmed that of France iu'
some eight months. 1t took Uncle
Sam only ninety days to dissipate the
power of Spain in two oceans.
If the figures of history are correct
terrible slaughter reigned in the old
days when men met in hand-to-handI
conflict and quarter was neither ask
ed nor given. In 451 A. D., at ths|
battle of Chalons, when Attila the
Hun and the Roman legions under
Aetius met, it is said that not fewer
than 100000 men were slain indeed
by some the number of killed has,
been placed as high as 100000. All
Hastings some 10000 men fell,
though the numbers engaged were
small in comparison with those ill
modern battles.
We are told that at the Metaurus
Hasdrubal's Carthaginians were prac'|
tically annihilated. At Aquae Sex
tiae and Verzellae the Cimbri and
Teutons were completely exterminat
ed by Marius; a hundred years laterl
10000 Romans were wiped out byI
Arminius in Teutoberg Forest, and
$4,000 Roman citizens of the Greek
cities were slain in single day byl
the soldiers of Mithridates. At Crecyl
there fell 1000 French knights, 14OBl
gentlemen and 1000 men at arms, be-
sides 10000 of inferior rank; 10000
men were killed at Agincourt and
$4,000 were taken prisoners; and
about 10000 men, too, weres lain out
of the 10000 who fought at Flodden;
while out of the 100000 engaged IN
the fierce battle of Towton $4,000 arc
reported to have fallen in the battle
and pursuit.
In all thes old-time battles, where
the weapons were bows and arrows
swords and battle axes, and where No
weapon was available that could XIII
at a distance of more than few nun
dred yards, the mortality Frequently
rose to one in every three or iOui
fighters engaged, and sometimes eN
ceeded this enormous percentage
whereas in modern battles, Will
weapons far more deadly propOrI
ton of one in twenty, it is clalmeu
has rarely been exceeded.
At Alma the casualties were nl'y
four thousand, or, roughly, one "
1876: at Inkerman they were one y
twenty; at Sedan, one in sixty; ~
Gravelotte, one in hundred anO
eleven, and at Waterloo, one IN tweI
ty-four. In the Crfmean war 1t LIDS
been calculated 742 shots were 10
quired to dispatch one fighter, anu d,
Gibraltar 25S,3S7 shot and shell iouns
only 1871 human targets, ana 81
these many were merely Wounuou
During the F'ranco-Prussian war Oa'
fighter was disabled by every 1''