What does it mean when we read in a general narrative that such and such division "applied pressure" or "kept the enemy engaged" or "they made probing attacks" -- that they waved sticks at each other or demonstrated?
There is an esoteric terminology used in battle descriptions to explain in general terms what was happening, we generally get details only if a particular event was critical or pivotal. Not every deployment in the course of a battle is a matter of earthshaking consequence unless something important came of it.
This brings us to the question of the arguments noted by Chandler (Campaigns of Napoleon, pages 348/50), where the Oman/Fortesque and Colin/Hilaire-Belloc schools of military historians disagree as to whether French commanders deliberately ran their columns at deployed lines, or if in each individual case, this was the result of a moment's error or miscalculation.
THE COLUMN AND THE LINEAR SYSTEM
Leaving aside grand tactics and all specialized tactical objectives such as river crossings, attack and defense of towns, fortifications, field works, fighting in woods, mountains, etc., etc., the immediate tactical objective, when two armies met in the field was for the attacker to attempt to dislodge the defender from the ground he held. It was the first step, from the success or failure of which virtually all else would derive.
Yet, no matter how clever or sophisticated the operational doctrines brought into play, the moment of truth would not arrive until the antagonists closed that final no-man's land that separated them.
In Antiquity, this gap did not project a great deal further than a sword's or pike's reach, until slingers and archers began to extend it one to two hundred yards. In modern times, it is determined by the reach of the rifleman's weapon which, in theory, is about as far as a man can see.
Even so, today the gap is little better than 250 to 300 yards, the effective range of small arms. Exservicemen, no doubt, will remember how small those huge targets looked even at two hundred yards on the rifle range. For all the accuracy of modern rifles, experience has proven that there is no such thing as aimed rifle fire in combat. Instead, one talks in terms of controlling a zone, a task usually accomplished by automatic weapons.
During the period of the muzzle loading smoothbore musket, the effective range did not reach much above 200 to 250 paces. Even so, fire was often opened at 350 and even 400 paces. Though this was regarded a waste of ammunition, the activity of loading and firing at ranges which produced relatively few casualties (for friend and foe) and the concomitant noise worked much in the way of an anestethic for high-strung nerves.
The appearance of the fusil provided the soldier with a relatively light weapon. Its improved firing mechanism and pre-packaged ammunition made it possible to teach the average man to handle the piece with competence in a matter of days, even if months were required to turn him into a fully trained 18th Century musketier. The flint lock was far safer than the old matchlock but had a comparatively high rate of misfires-though they did not exceed 15% under ordinary conditions.
The first and most telling effect of the fusil or musket (as I will refer to it, the term musket was originally applied only to the heavier firearms of larger bore, fired from a fork rest), on tactics was that it made everyone defensive- minded. Although its improved efficiency had elevated it from a supporting role to the main arm of the infantry by reversing the proportion of firearms to pikes, its relatively slow rate of fire still required the protection of the pike against sudden offensive moves.
Even after the bayonet appeared, more decades passed before the pike disappeared from the ranks. By the time pure fire tactics had won the day, everyone had gained such respect for the firepower of deployed lines that linear tactics had, in itself, become a defensive mode of warfare. A man standing in place could work his musket more effectively than another who had to cease fire periodically in order to advance. Thus, the deployed firing line became and remained a tough nut to crack for any infantryman who attempted to close with it armed with the same weapon. And it stayed that way until the muzzle loading rifle extended both range and accuracy.
It has been a common misconception that the French invented column and tirailleur tactics, making linear tactics obsolete. What these new tactics did was add punch to the old linear system of pure fire tactics. Thus in theory if not in practice, the linear tactic always remained a part of the Napoleonic system. The column, which was to give its name to the Napoleonic system was merely the most common of several tactical forms. Without the linear formation, there was no "ordre mixte" even if this was to become more and more of an ideal as the Napoleonic Wars dragged on.
Finally, it must be mentioned that the roots of the column reach deeply into the past, before Napoleon or the Revolution. The problem with linear tactics was that once the potential of the musket was recognized and utilized by all the military establishments during the 18th Century, the musketier formations were thinned out to three or four ranks so that everybody who had a musket could fire. The military world entered upon an era of pure fire tactics. This brought with it a desire to find a way to meet each and every tactical eventuality with a special kind of musketry. This gave rise to numerous and complicated control systems, all of which took up an inordinate amount of time in practice and of which many either never got past the drill grounds or failed when attempted in the field. Only the most simple survived.
Of course, there were military men of influence who were fully aware of all this even while pure fire tactics was still rising to its zenith. There were two schools of thought. The dissenters were those who thought musketry was not terribly effective, that small arms fire was a waste of time and good men and served only to delay the decision. The Mareshal cle Saxe was among the first to theorize up an entire system of column tactics by way of a summation of his considerable military experience. Even Frederick the Creat, who in his time had the best infantry one could buy in any store in Europe, was keenly aware of the dreadful losses his infantry had to absorb in order to come to grips with the enemy. He too, drew up plans for column attacks (his brother, Prince Henry, even made use of them near the end of the Seven Years' War) and tried them out on maneuvers during the early 1750s.
But the firepower of deployed infantry lines was such that he did not dare to bring these onto the battlefields of the Seven Years' War except in small ways on special occasions. Instead, he tried to push his lines through the small arms fire zone at the quick step, without firing. The results at Prague and Kolin were disastrous. It would be wise to pause for a moment to consider just what sort of firepower we are talking about.
I am frequently made keenly aware in the course of conversations that the average person thinks of smoothbore musketry in terms of individual weapons which a man trained to ordinary standards might fire two, perhaps even three times a minute (if he was very good). What is frequently forgotten is that these individuals stood elbow to elbow two, three or four ranks deep. In the case of a battalion, about 600 men on somewhat less than 200 yards frontage! At an average of two rounds per man per minute, we are talking about 1,200 rounds per minute. This was, until the advent of the MG 42, the cyclic rate of a modern machine gun!
At the measured cadence necessary to keep long lines in order, troops would move through the small arms zone at the rate of about 15 yards per minute. The 150 or so cadence of the "pas cle charge" of Napoleonic times would translate into 80 or 90 yards a minute. Now, the modern machinegun is not exactly a sharpshooter's weapon.
Anyone who has ever seen the traces of a burst against the side of a building knows that there can be a vertical spray of ten feet or more from ground level up. It pokes a good share of its output into the air or the ground as well. But has anyone any doubt what a machinegun could do to a column coming downrange in open country, fully exposed for two or three minutes? So wipe from your minds the image of a man loading and firing a musket- instead, think of several hundred men doing it together along a front of less than 200 yards!
Before departing from the column experiments of the linear era, there is yet the case of Folard, who also experimented with a massive column of attack which could be formed with from two to six battalions. I had always been under the impression that this was but yet another bit of theorizing.
But Dr. Schwarz, in his monumental work on "800 Years of Infantry Tactics", says a case can be documented that the French did indeed attempt to use it, albeit badly, at Rossbach. Barsewisch, one of the best Prussian diarists of the Seven Years' War, speaks of the Swiss in a column "a hundred men deep." Of course, the first Prussian battalions, without waiting for their neighbors to come up to them, immediately leveled off at this juggernaut with well-known results.
For the French, it was a preview of things to come half a century later. Certainly, it offered Frederick no reason to change, his mind. Instead, he sought to gain the tactical advantage by being. able to deploy his still quick-firing infantry in every direction conceivable, but so quickly that his adversaries had no opportunity to react i n ti me. Even for military men of our time, it is difficult to appreciate the amount of practice involved to make the linearsystern work. One must not forget that even if the Prussian peasant soldier spent only about two months a year drilling, working the farms the rest of the time, everything changed drastically, once the army went on campaign. Then, every day was training day. A man literally lived and, if necessary, died in the ranks.
When the army assembled, it would do so in order of battle. Then it marched off in columns until it reached the day's destination. Once arrived, it would deploy once again into order of battle to pitch camp. Day in and day out, the soldier of the linear era walked, ate, slept and, on occasion, died in order of battle, in the ranks. This is a far cry from the descriptions we have of the French moving across country in loose swarms. True, the call of drum or bugle would quickly bring them into order and they were indeed good at their game. But it was an altogether different game-not linear tactics. Neither the Revolutionary nor the Napoleonic soldier knew the daily diet of discipline, practice and drill necessary to function effectively in the linear system.
More Column vs. Line
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