Organization of a balloon unit

[jetpack]

I'm wondering how a military ballooning unit like the French Compagnie d'Aerostatiers or the Union Army Balloon Corps was organized. I think early flight was really cool, but I don't know much about it.

The Wikipedia page for the French Compagnie d'Aerostatiers says that they were founded in 1794 with the following personnel

• 1 army captain
• 1 lieutenant
• 1 sergeant major
• 1 sergeant
• 2 corporals
• 20 privates

A couple questions to give a sense of the kind of things I'd like to talk about here:

1. Is 26 people enough to operate one or two balloons, or did they have to hire more people to get off the proverbial ground?
2. What are the jobs of people at each rank? What ranks are the people actually in the balloons, and how many people are in a balloon? Any privates up there, or do people need to be higher rank to have training in flight, signaling, recon, or artillery guidance?
3. This particular company had two balloons. Did they have enough personnel to keep both balloons going at once, or just one at a time?

I gotta admit I like the air force flavor of a balloon always being piloted by an officer, and I like the naval flavor of a balloon having a captain onboard. I don't know if that's who did that work or if the officers were always giving orders from the ground.

 

[Behemoth]

I would imagine that if the company were set up as the way you posted it, then it may have been divided into two platoons (I am not sure of the French equivalent) with one platoon for each balloon. The privates would most likely perform the grunt work and report to a corporal, which, at least with the U.S. military, is a junior non-commissioned officer. Other than that, I am not sure that I can be of more help due to my lack of knowledge on the subject.

 

[jetpack]

I would imagine that if the company were set up as the way you posted it, then it may have been divided into two platoons (I am not sure of the French equivalent) with one platoon for each balloon. The privates would most likely perform the grunt work and report to a corporal, which, at least with the U.S. military, is a junior non-commissioned officer. Other than that, I am not sure that I can be of more help due to my lack of knowledge on the subject.

Thanks. I can see that there's a lot of grunt work: sewing, hammering, tying, carrying things, and running messages.

This is a really small company, isn't it? I thought a company usually had about 100 people.

 

[Behemoth]

Thanks. I can see that there's a lot of grunt work: sewing, hammering, tying, carrying things, and running messages.

This is a really small company, isn't it? I thought a company usually had about 100 people.

IMO, it is quite small for a company sized element and would be closer to the size of a platoon. However, in the case of reconnaissance, a smaller sized unit is preferable.

 

[sloreck]

You have to remember that you need the gas generating apparatus - hydrogen gas was generated was generated by the combination of iron filings and sulfuric acid (H2SO4 + Fe = H2 + FESO4). This took up one to three wagons for the apparatus and supplies. You also needed at least two wagons for the deflated balloon and basket, and the assorted other items such as mooring lines, the telegraph, telescopes, sketching materials etc. Then you need some wagons for food, forage, tents. You'll need one or two soldiers per wagon, plus those to run the apparatus, security etc.

 

[jetpack]

IMO, it is quite small for a company sized element and would be closer to the size of a platoon. However, in the case of reconnaissance, a smaller sized unit is preferable.

Yeah, the more I look at it, the more I think the size of this company is really weird. Wikipedia says in one spot that a platoon has 15-30 soldiers, and another says 40-50. Either this is not the final size of the company, or they chose to call it a company even though it's tiny. Nowadays, it's not weird for special operations platoons to be commanded by captains (again, according to Wikipedia), so maybe back then the procedure for nifty high tech groups was to call it a company even when it's platoon-sized.

Having two officers and two sergeants makes sense for two platoons, and I think that's a pretty sensible way of arranging things.

 

[Behemoth]

One phrase that I learned in the military: Semper Gumby. As ridiculous as it sounds it was used to tell the troops that the group needs to always be flexible due to ever changing conditions. While it may not necessarily line up with what sources state on how large a company should be, it certainly makes some sense. It could just be that with a company like this that they provided just enough manpower to get the mission done but not enough where it was a strain on resources.

I would recommend that you take Wikipedia with a grain of salt though.

 

[arctic warrior]

Danish Balloon Companies part of the artillery used mainly for spotting - established 1889; by 1932 party to Army Air Corps; strengh by 1943 when fighting the German occupation troops:
8 officers
12 NCOs
ca.130 enlisted men
varying number of technical staff
1 ballon and 1-3 in reserve
500 bottles of hydrogen
20 trucks with trailers
2 staff cars
2-3 motorcycles

 

[jetpack]

That's really helpful info, arctic warrior. I wasn't aware of the Danish Balloon Companies. Can you point me to a source of yours, or some phrases I can Google?
Now I found this Wikipedia page, which might be what you're looking at: da.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ballonparken.

Then I found this: http://www.chakoten.dk/haerens-flyvertropper-ballonparken/ which has this gem:
På årlige kurser uddannedes ballonførere, ballonobservatører (kornetter og officerer) og ballonmestre (underofficerer og befalingsmænd af officiantgruppen).

By Google Translate:
At annual rates educated balloon operators, balloon observers (cornets and officers) and balloon masters (NCOs and officers of the officiant group). Officers who passed the tests could on application put in number in Ballonparken.

I'll put in a little time trying to parse through the more technical Danish words here. A kornet seems to be a low-ranking cavalry officer (like in English some centuries ago), or a conscript who has as much education as an officer. Not sure what the difference between "officer" and "befalingsmænd af officientgruppen" is yet.

 

[arctic warrior]

I guess the Chakoten text is the foundation of the Wikipedia one.
Looking up "Salomonsens konversationsleksikon" on ze net: Kornet was men doing national service/conscripts who post NCO training held a rank between corporal and sergeant though with a higher education destined for Officers training. They were a NCO which served for 6 months and then were elegible for Officers training serving with both cavalry and infantry.
Officiant is somewhat unclear but apparently accoding to Salomonsen they were technical officers recruited among the senior NCOs who were given a one year training at the Officers academy and then went back to units acting usually as technical offficers. Not unlike a British or US Warrant Officer.

 

[Corjomc]

If enough of these pre-powered flight groups come into existance how does everybody see Arial combat developing?

That may effect how the balloon unit is set up.

 

[sloreck]

Tethered balloons using hydrogen for a lifting gas aren't in a position to fight each other - they are too far away. Even so, until you have modern cartridge weapons firing 1870 era weapons from a hydrogen balloon...unsafe

 

[Corjomc]

Maybe just have long range snipers go balloon hunting?

 

[jetpack]

If enough of these pre-powered flight groups come into existence how does everybody see Arial combat developing?

That may effect how the balloon unit is set up.

During the US civil war, the balloons were a very popular target, so ground-to-air attacks would definitely be very popular. Snipers would do well at this, and at longer ranges you have artillery. When your target is a balloon, you don't have to work hard to find your target.

The balloons were also close enough that the US aeronaut and the Confederate aeronaut could look at each other in at least one battle. I don't think that was typical, since the balloons let you see 15 miles away. At least it tells you that sometimes it might be helpful to have a sniper in the air. Snipers, however, are not used to operating with a big obvious 40 foot wide target on then. During that era, big balloons could hold 5 people, or 4 people and a telegraph.

I read somewhere about WWI or WWII balloons having gunners associated with them to keep the balloons safe. WWII is the era of powered balloons, so I don't know if it's in the scope of your question. By then, balloons are much bigger, so they might be able to start carrying a halfway decent long-range gun. I know there were threads on airship weapons here that emphasized that an airship can't carry a truly powerful naval gun but I don't know what the limit is (and an airship is much much bigger than the balloons I intended to discuss in this thread.)

 

[Saphroneth]

My guess on the small size of that unit is that the unit is the specialists, and then they'd draft in dozens of infantrymen on detached duty. Same way the artillery worked.

 

[jetpack]

Tethered balloons using hydrogen for a lifting gas aren't in a position to fight each other - they are too far away. Even so, until you have modern cartridge weapons firing 1870 era weapons from a hydrogen balloon...unsafe

Actually, good point. Disregard what I said about bringing rifles up there, or having a mounted gun on the balloon.

 

[jetpack]

My guess on the small size of that unit is that the unit is the specialists, and then they'd draft in dozens of infantrymen on detached duty. Same way the artillery worked.

Thanks for the contribution That's pretty plausible. I didn't know about that practice in artillery practice. In the last couple days I've been reading a lot about the Union Balloon Corps in the American Civil War. For one balloon, they had one civilian aeronaut (occasionally called "captain") who's in charge and who is the one that actually flies the balloon, one or a few general assistants, and enough teamsters to handle four wagons. They also borrowed from the army: about 30 enlisted men from nearby companies, sometimes one officer, sometimes a telegraph officer (civilian who works for the army). I don't know how to compare the scales of the operations between the 1790s and the 1860s, since in the later case you have more labor saving technology, but you also have bigger balloons and bigger ambitions.

I guess the Chakoten text is the foundation of the Wikipedia one.
Looking up "Salomonsens konversationsleksikon" on ze net: Kornet was men doing national service/conscripts who post NCO training held a rank between corporal and sergeant though with a higher education destined for Officers training. They were a NCO which served for 6 months and then were elegible for Officers training serving with both cavalry and infantry.
Officiant is somewhat unclear but apparently accoding to Salomonsen they were technical officers recruited among the senior NCOs who were given a one year training at the Officers academy and then went back to units acting usually as technical offficers. Not unlike a British or US Warrant Officer.

I realize I haven't properly thanked you for this. It does shed a lot of light into how things operate. I'm working on a big write up summarizing everything I've been reading over the last week about this. This is key to understanding how balloons were used in WWII. An observer is an officer of a person in training to be an officer, a balloon master is a senior NCO or warrant officer, and I don't know what rank a balloon operator (ballonfører) has. In general it looks like flying is an officer's job. By the way, I see that the Danish Army currently has an "offiserselev" rank between korporal and sergent. Since officerselev means "officer's student", do you suppose this is the same thing as a kornet, but under a new name?

 

[Saphroneth]

Thanks for the contribution That's pretty plausible. I didn't know about that practice in artillery practice.

Yeah, it's one of the many things that's an absolute bugger for working out the real strength of Union units, because the Union had (say) 20 men per battery and the rest of the ones they needed were on secondment from the infantry, while the Confederacy had (say) 20 men per battery and the rest were e.g. black slaves.

 

[galveston bay]

My guess on the small size of that unit is that the unit is the specialists, and then they'd draft in dozens of infantrymen on detached duty. Same way the artillery worked.

except artillery didn't work that way at all

based on this the average artillery battery has between 70 to 190 men, none of whom are detached from other branches ... same with the Confederate Army. They man between 4-8 guns depending on type (page 58 has the number of personnel assigned)

https://books.google.com/books?id=xfGGwoL-E4wC&pg=PA56&lpg=PA56&dq=table+of+organization+of+battery+of+artillery+union+army&source=bl&ots=-rSZZ3Iy8e&sig=vLB8_nXf9hfif5LqDg8tsu50N3Q&hl=en&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiGpY-7wbHSAhVB0WMKHeIiDSU4ChDoAQgeMAE#v=onepage&q=table of organization of battery of artillery union army&f=false


I found this 173 page paper from the US Army Command and Staff College on the subject
http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a284682.pdf

a quick scan didn't show me the actual table of organization but it does provide a thorough history and the problems and achievements by the limited battlefield use during the Civil War

There is however an extensive bibliography so that may offer some leads to what the actual organization looked like in terms of personnel.

 

[sloreck]

Balloons were used for observation during WWI, and were very heavily protected by AAA which made "balloon busting" dangerous. From early on observers in balloons had parachutes, unlike HTA aircrew. Balloons as such were not used during WWII except unmanned barrage balloons. Blimps were, of course, used heavily in ASW warfare primarily by the USN.

One big difference between balloons in the ACW and for some time thereafter was that initially the hydrogen for balloons was generated on the spot (iron and sulphuric acid reaction) where later on hydrogen (and for the USA helium) was in compressed gas cylinders.