1860s Army Comparison

[Saphroneth]

This thread is partly because I've been guilty of pulling ACW threads off course into discussion on the relative effectiveness of other armies.

So - I'll do my utmost to use this thread instead.



As a bit of a starter, I'll note the following.

As of the ACW era, each army is as such:


The British have had two wars in the last ten years, and have developed (and are perfecting) a doctrine focused on the Rifle-Musket to the limits of the capacity of this weapon. They have unusually high troop numbers for them (220,000 to 230,000 regulars alone over the period of the ACW) and good, accurate breech loading artillery.

The French have also had multiple recent wars, and their doctrine at this time is focused on offensive action. They have some skirmish units, but most of what they do is based on a heavy assault - almost literally a sprint. Their artillery is rifled, but not used as it should be (they're using them as more accurate smoothbores without exploiting their range). They also use the rifle-musket.

The Prussians have not had a particularly recent war. They're using the Dreyse needlegun, an early breechloader and one which has problems of range and accuracy which make it essentially little different from a faster, somewhat longer ranged smoothbore - but starting around 1863 they reform their accuracy training so as to ensure that they can use the Dreyse very effectively.

The Austrians have recently been defeated by the French, and as such they change their doctrine wholesale to use assault instead of ranged fire. Their artillery is starting to modernize with Krupp guns (as are the lesser German states) and they are armed with a quite serviceable rifled-musket.

The Russians are still reforming after the Crimea (that is, in my understanding).

The Union and the Confederacy share many strengths and weaknesses. Among the strengths is a well motivated population, while the weaknesses largely stem from how a prewar army of ~16,000 is having to provide training and structure to an army which, adding North and South, is over fifty times this size. Accuracy training and bayonet assaults are both poor, and early in the war the weapons are dire.




Useful comparison statistics would be appreciated.

 

[Saphroneth]

Here's one example of actual battle statistics:

"At Vittoria, one bullet in, at the best, 459 took effect; at the Alma and Inkerman, one in sixteen." Hew Strachan, From Waterloo to Balaclava: Tactics, Technology, and the British Army, 1815-1854 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985, p54).


"For Gettysburg we have a Confederate ordnance estimate that each man fired an average of 25-26 rounds... If they are accurate, we can set them beside the Union casualties of some 23,000 men to arrive at a figure of 81 shots fired to inflict each casualty, or maybe nearer to 100 infantry shots per casualty if we also count in the contribution of the artillery.

"Rather better figures are available- as in so many other aspects of the war- for the Union forces... The calculations give a notional 180 rounds fired for every casualty inflicted by the Federals, although that is without counting the artillery's contribution. A fair guess would be that each casualty caused by infantry fire required the expenditure of 200 rounds. This is higher than the rather unreliable figures for the Confederate side, but consistent with the order of magnitude recorded for the Napoleonic wars." Paddy Griffith, Battle Tactics of the American Civil War (Marlborough: Crowood Press, 2001) pp. 84-5

 

[Redbeard]

The Prussians were heavily involved in the 1st Slesvig-Holsten war of 1848-5, although mainly as "volunteers" on the rebel side and not that successful. 10 years later a lot had happened in the Prussian army. Not at least it had been equipped with rifled artillery, IMHO the most decisive weapon at this time. Next its leadership was superb, not only with Moltke the Older as person in command but also due to the perfected General Staff system and doctrines of leadership he had evolved. It was under Moltke that "Auftragstaktik" seriously evolved and the Prussians IMHO were quite unique in turning petit-burgeois diligence into military efficiency.

 

[Saphroneth]

Rifled artillery for the Prussian army in... 1858, I assume?
Interesting, because I'd been under the impression they didn't get their Krupp RBL guns until at least the 1860s. Were they Krupp RBLs or something RML?

And I'd also had the understanding that it was the reforms of the early 1860s which made the Prussian Army into the force that would later shine in 1866 and especially 1871.

 

[Saphroneth]

Now, based on the numbers in post #2, here's how Gettysburg would have gone if relative range and accuracy had no effect on the flow of the battle - just the same number of bullets were fired in both cases - and the British were in place of:

1) The Union. With 1/16 of rounds hitting instead of 1/200, the average bullet is 12.5 times more likely to cause a casualty. As such the CSA takes about 250,000 casualties.
By reductio ad absurdam we can see that the British would have won Gettysburg extremely easily against an enemy of the quality of the CSA.

2) The Confederacy. With 1/16 of rounds hitting instead of 1/100, the average bullet is 6.5 times more likely to cause a casualty. Union takes about 110,000 casualties, and is pretty much wrecked as an army.

And again, this isn't factoring in how the British were able to hit at much longer ranges - or the much better British artillery.

Though that accuracy difference, if sustained, starts to explain how the CSA held out for so long - their troops were simply better man-for-man:


A force of 1000 with a 0.5% hit rate inflicts 5 casualties per volley, and a force of 700 with a 1% hit rate inflicts 7 casualties per volley. The forces both take about 0.7% casualties per volley, so the hit rate disparity of a factor of two means roughly that a soldier is worth 1.4 times that of his enemy.
This is basically Lanchester Square, and it suggests the average British regular was roughly 3.5 times as effective as a Union soldier and 2.5 times as effective as a Confederate soldier based purely on hit rate. (Testing it out, we find that a British force of 1,000 men inflicts 60 casualties per volley, and that a Union force of 3,400 inflicts 17 casualties per volley. Both are causing 1.7% casualties on their enemy per shot - thus a British regular battalion of Alma/Inkerman quality is roughly equivalent to a particularly large Union brigade.)

This is particularly interesting in a Trent-War environment, as - notwithstanding that the Army of the Potomac at Gettysburg is the Union Army at or near their peak - the British freeing up 60,000 troops out of their 100,000 Home Establishment is the rough combat power equivalent of 210,000 Union soldiers - before counting Canadian militia.

 

[Tanc49]

Question: how do you account for the massive discrepency? Is it just training or is the material to blame?

Do you have figures for France?

 

[Redbeard]

Rifled artillery for the Prussian army in... 1858, I assume?
Interesting, because I'd been under the impression they didn't get their Krupp RBL guns until at least the 1860s. Were they Krupp RBLs or something RML?

And I'd also had the understanding that it was the reforms of the early 1860s which made the Prussian Army into the force that would later shine in 1866 and especially 1871.

I haven't got the exact years of introduction, but during the 2nd S-H War in early 1864 they for sure were well equipped with rifled artillery and effectively smashed the Danish fortifications at Dybbøl while being out of range from the Danish smooth bore artillery.

 

[Saphroneth]

I haven't got the exact years of introduction, but during the 2nd S-H War in early 1864 they for sure were well equipped with rifled artillery and effectively smashed the Danish fortifications at Dybbøl while being out of range from the Danish smooth bore artillery.

Yeah, the impression I got was that the RBL came in late 1850s and early 1860s.

Question: how do you account for the massive discrepency? Is it just training or is the material to blame?

Do you have figures for France?

Training - as in the British did a lot of it, and the Americans basically didn't have any organized system at all. One side is saying "do 110 practice rounds a year and record the results, with public accolades to the best", the other is saying "Aim low!"

France I don't have good figures for at the moment. I know they had training - the Ecole du Tir - in this time period, but it didn't go as far as the British. (Fewer shots, shorter ranges - first class British shots could hit a target half the time at 900 yards!)

 

[carlton_bach]

One thing to consider is that European armies had to be at a much higher level of general readiness because thesituation allowed for much less failure tolerance. Take an extreme example:

War between Austria and Prussia was declared on 19 June 1866.

15 days later, an army of 221,000 Prussians with 700 field guns and allies met an army of 215,000 Austrians with 650 field guns. In the course of one day, the battle was decided at a cost of probably somewhere around 10,000 dead (the battle had a lot of 'missing') and the austrians had effectively lost the war.

Before this encounter, there had already been battles on a smaller scale a Trautenau (27 June, 15,000 vs 25,000 engaged), Langensalza (27 June, c. 9000 vs. c. 17,000 engaged), Skalitz (28 June, each side one army corps, exact number of troops engaged unknown) and Gitchin (29 June, 24 vs. 33 battalions engaged, supported by a small artillery complement),

No European belligerent party had anything like the deep time and deep space margin that the parties in the USA/CSA conflict enjoyed. They had to maintain an expensive military infrastructure to support immediate responses. Can you imagine how the Civil war would have gone if either side had been able to put 200,000 trained men and 700 field guns on enemy territory two weeks after Fort Sumter?

 

[dandan_noodles]

My impression was that the Austrians had the superior artillery in the 1866 war, and the Prussians didn't really have mass steel breech loaders until the war with France.

 

[Saphroneth]

No European belligerent party had anything like the deep time and deep space margin that the parties in the USA/CSA conflict enjoyed. They had to maintain an expensive military infrastructure to support immediate responses.

Well, more like that the parties in the USA/CSA conflict felt they could get away with. The distance Richmond-Washington was only a hundred miles or so, so if one side had been able to muster even two divisions of moderately competent infantry by month three they'd have won easily.

But yes in that European powers had very big standing armies compared to the US - and often bigger navies, too. Six powers in 1860 had steam line-of-battle ships; the US wasn't one of them. If the US had had a hefty navy in 1861 then the blockade would have been established a lot quicker and more concretely.

 

[RodentRevolution]

Yeah, the impression I got was that the RBL came in late 1850s and early 1860s.


Training - as in the British did a lot of it, and the Americans basically didn't have any organized system at all. One side is saying "do 110 practice rounds a year and record the results, with public accolades to the best", the other is saying "Aim low!"

France I don't have good figures for at the moment. I know they had training - the Ecole du Tir - in this time period, but it didn't go as far as the British. (Fewer shots, shorter ranges - first class British shots could hit a target half the time at 900 yards!)

One of the problems with training was there was little or no organisation for supplying recruits to the regiments in the field. I have a source for the US side that essentially demonstrates that regiments were simply burnt up and very often men once they had served a short enlistment simply went home.

The US Army Replacement System

The pdf cover a lot of periods besides the Civil War but the specific chapter on the Civil War can be found at page 71 in text which is 85 going by the pdf document.

 

[Galba Otho Vitelius]

I was thinking of doing a "What If" along these lines. Pretty much what if instead of the IOTL Crimean War, a general European war breaks out with the 1914 alignments.

That is Prussia, Austria-Hungary, and Turkey against the world. The German Confederation would side with Prussia and Austria-Hungary. You don't have "Italy", but Savoy-Sardinia could side with the British, the French, and the Russians. Through in some Balkan revolts against the Turks. Brazil and Portugal could side with the British on paper but not do anything, and after a while the US could join the anti-German coalition.

The ASB aspect of course is why is the UK joining the anti-German alliance at this point in history.

Still, ignoring the diplomacy, how would this play out?

 

[Saphroneth]

One of the problems with training was there was little or no organisation for supplying recruits to the regiments in the field. I have a source for the US side that essentially demonstrates that regiments were simply burnt up and very often men once they had served a short enlistment simply went home.

Yes, I've seen that as a theme too. The raising of new regiments rather than adding troops to old ones, which means that there's no real way of picking up experience or esprit de corps and which also means there's no driver for standardization.
From memory one state (Wisconsin) was an exception.
The upshot was that Wisconsin seems to have raised fewer regiments than would be expected, but as Sherman's memoirs put it, each Wisconsin Regiment was the size of a Brigade (by 1864, the Bayonet strength of a Brigade was about 8-900).


What's interesting is that the CSA apparently didn't do this - instead they, like Wisconsin, replenished regiments as they were diminished by desertion, disease, and... d-bullets.

 

[Saphroneth]

Still, ignoring the diplomacy, how would this play out?

Depends a lot on the time period - with no Crimean War the British Army's a lot worse than it was in 1861. (Still very good, but for example it has 70,000 less deployable manpower and no Volunteer movement, as well as a less functional Militia, and it's not got the Armstrong either. In 1861 the British Army could quite possibly have defeated any other single army in the world on land; with no Crimean War it's much more iffy.)

 

[RodentRevolution]

What's interesting is that the CSA apparently didn't do this - instead they, like Wisconsin, replenished regiments as they were diminished by desertion, disease, and... d-bullets.

Deadly wounds?

 

[Saphroneth]

Deadly wounds?

Perhaps.


I've mentioned before, but I'd really love to have a proper computer game about this period. ACW games (and real battles) only capture a small fraction of what was possible in the 1850-1890 era, and it's perhaps the only time in history where genuine infantry-to-infantry combat taking place over ranges of upwards of half a mile is anything like as prevalent.




Oh, the other thing I was going to mention was the impact the Crimean War had on the British Army.

Pre Crimea, the British Army was not exactly small (it was several times the size of the US regular army) but was mostly tied down in garrisons. The British managed to deploy upwards of 50,000 at one time to the Crimea (not a small feat, it's as far from Britain as New York) but that army was essentially a smoothbore-artillery force which pulled through on the amazing skill of their infantry.


As of late 1861, the British army was as follows - from the NYT in many cases. Note horses sometimes not available in data:

Regulars
219,000 men 30,000 horses 366 guns (all the guns are RBL Armstrongs, all the men armed with Enfields)
British Local and Colonial regulars
18,200 men 248 guns (artillery may be RBL or SBML, unclear)
Foreign and Coloured Troops (mainly India)
218,000 men 58 guns (most of the infantry are armed with Brunswick rifles or .656 smoothbores)
Military Police in India
79,000 men

Trained reserves
Pensioners
~14,000 men
Militia
114,000 All Ranks present at 1861 inspection
Volunteers
163,000 (1863)


Grand totals
534,000 men under arms in time of peace with 672 artillery pieces
291,000 men in trained reserves

Or 825,000 men total.
(Obviously not all deployable at once, but in time of peace there's 420,000 men in India! That's enormous!)

A lot of this is expansion from the Crimean War - the deployable force in time of crisis has grown by at least 70,000 men (as this is the expansion of the regulars since the Crimea and they're now supported by more trained reserves to handle second line duties).

 

[Saphroneth]

Now then - artillery.

At the time (1860s) everyone's switching to rifles. The British have completely rearmed with the excellent Armstrong gun (a weapon about as reliable as the Krupp from a decade hence, but which is later discarded as unreliable). The French are sticking with their "4-lber" (actually 4 kg) RML guns from 1859, everyone in Germany is buying Krupp, I'm not sure what the Russians are doing, and meanwhile in America there's this eclectic mix of a few sophisticated pieces plus a lot of iffy Parrott rifles and a quite startling number of smoothbore 12-lbers.

 

[cerebropetrologist]

Here's one example of actual battle statistics:

Here's another: 'At Solferino, the Austrians fired about 8,400,000 cartridges, which killed about 2,000 French and Sardinians, and wounded some 10,000 more. On an average then, one shot in seven hundred took effect, and one man was killed for every 4,200 shots fired.' ('Cavalry, its history, management and uses in war' found here).

8,400,000 cartridges seems like a lot for 129,000 soldiers (65 rounds per soldier) but at just over 20 minutes of solid firing I suppose it's humanly possible.

everyone in Germany is buying Krupp

I found this:

Prussia bought 312 6pdrs in 1859 and 300 4pdrs in 1864: in 1861 Hanover, Baden, Wurttemberg, and Hesse-Darmstadt all followed suit. Despite the low level of military spending and general lack of urgency for reform in the Confederation, almost all German states had purchased a number of Krupps by the time war broke out. Breech-loading Krupp steel artillery formed two of Baden's four field batteries; armed Brunswick's single field battery; formed four of Hanover's six (despite their rushed departure from the kingdom resulting in them leaving behind a fully equipped 6pdr battery in Stade to be captured by the Prussians); equipped all three of Grand Ducal Hesse's field batteries and two of the three field batteries belonging to the Mecklenburgs; represented one of the two field batteries that Nassau, Oldenburg and Wurttemberg each deployed; and furnished five of the nine Saxon foot batteries.

However, I don't speak German so I can't vouch for the source.

 

[Saphroneth]

Here's another: 'At Solferino, the Austrians fired about 8,400,000 cartridges, which killed about 2,000 French and Sardinians, and wounded some 10,000 more. On an average then, one shot in seven hundred took effect, and one man was killed for every 4,200 shots fired.' ('Cavalry, its history, management and uses in war' found here).

Cripes, that's terrible. I suppose that's what happens when you try firing at very long range against a rapidly moving enemy without excellent training...