Slings and grenades in 17th century

Neirdak

Banned
I was watching television today and suddenly saw one documentary about Syrian conflict, in which a rebel was throwing modern hand grenades with a sling above a wall and later directly on Syrian soldiers ... suddenly I got a weird idea to improve the deadliness of the European warfare in the 17th century.

It's interesting to read about historical grenades. "Grenadier" as you might expect has its origins in units that were specialized at heavy assault and the use of grenades. Grenades in the 17th and 18th century were iron balls filled with gunpowder and thus were heavier than anything we use today, so grenadiers tended to be atypically large for their time. Because hurling or rolling these iron balls of death could open breaches in enemy defensive positions or lines, grenadiers were often used for heavy assault actions. Over time the specialized grenade techniques lost importance, but grenadier as a name for regiments was kept in many armies as a traditional form, and became synonymous with "heavy assault" infantry. I looked more carefully at the first grenades and they were indeed small iron spheres filled with gunpowder fused with a length of slow-match, roughly the size of a cricket ball or a baseball, which is small. The use of a simple sling would have considerably increased their range.

I know that using a sling requires a lot of training to become effective, but we speak about elite soldiers who will take the time to train to master this weapon. The armored opponents problem is also solved, we throw explosives grenades at the enemy.

I suddenly began to imagine Royal Grenadiers slingers throwing grenades against French revolutionaries or French Grenadiers de la Garde pounding Wellington at Waterloo with such explosive devices. So my question is quite simple :

How much would warfare in Europe have changed, if those 17th century grenadiers began to use slings to throw their grenades ?
 
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It's not impossible, just very high potential for inflicting casualties on your own side if a grenade slips out of the sling and land among a packed infantry formation. We've had grenades a very long time, but armies never sling them despite the obvious link and instead went out of their way to invent projectors like flintlock hand mortars.

In the 19th century a type of grenade on a rope appeared together with a disk shaped impact fuse. Essentially this was a grenade sling but the sling remained attached when thrown. An even simpler and safer means to extend range of grenades is to attach a stick for leverage. The German potato masher nearly tripled the throwing range of spherical grenades.
 

Neirdak

Banned
It's not impossible, just very high potential for inflicting casualties on your own side if a grenade slips out of the sling and land among a packed infantry formation. We've had grenades a very long time, but armies never sling them despite the obvious link and instead went out of their way to invent projectors like flintlock hand mortars.

In the 19th century a type of grenade on a rope appeared together with a disk shaped impact fuse. Essentially this was a grenade sling but the sling remained attached when thrown. An even simpler and safer means to extend range of grenades is to attach a stick for leverage. The German potato masher nearly tripled the throwing range of spherical grenades.

If there is the risk of "inflicting casualties on your own side if a grenade slips out of the sling and land among a packed infantry formation", perhaps those grenades could only be thrown by skirmishers out of our own packed infantry formations.

Imagine the reaction of the enemy army when your skirmishers begin to throw grenades at them. Of course they will try to kill your grenade skirmishers with gun skirmishers, but yours will do the same. Most battles could be won, before they even begin.

Potato mashers seems to be a good idea too. :cool:
 
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I wonder about throwing grenades with a bolas. You would throw three grenades at a time, and extending range without the danger of grenade slipping out. The bolas throwing I've seen don't even involve wirling them around. Might be an effective cavalry weapon vs pike squares.
 

Neirdak

Banned
I wonder about throwing grenades with a bolas. You would throw three grenades at a time, and extending range without the danger of grenade slipping out. The bolas throwing I've seen don't even involve wirling them around. Might be an effective cavalry weapon vs pike squares.

Awesome idea :)

Especially when you know that boleadoras are used by Gauchos. Explosive bolas could be used by soldiers on foot or by horsemen, which would take highly efficient against pikemen (new kind of caracole tactics.). They could also be used against cavalry by infantrymen.
 
Before you get too enthusiastic, remember that the fuses for early grenades were basically just protruding wicks that had to be individually lit just before the grenade was thrown...
 
How do you ensure the proper orientation of the fuse through the whole slinging motion?

What's wrong with a flintlock grenade launcher? Besides, the flintlock grenade launcher will automatically light the grenade's fuse upon discharge, saving your grenadiers from having to carry a slow match around.
 
How much would warfare in Europe have changed, if those 17th century grenadiers began to use slings to throw their grenades ?

I believed it was common practice amongst the Spanish for many years:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sling_(weapon)

The sling is inexpensive and easy to build. It has historically been used for hunting game and in combat. Film exists of Spanish Civil War combatants using slings to throw grenades over buildings into enemy positions on the opposite street.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sling_(weapon)#cite_note-1

By the Middle Ages the shepherd's sling was largely militarily extinct outside the Iberian peninsula, where the Spanish and Portuguese infantry favoured it against light and agile Moorish troops; a sling projectile, while dangerous even against an armoured opponent, could be lethal against a light and unarmoured foe.
 
reading on that wiki page, why not evole it to using Staff Slings, which it can be used for greater range and/or heavier missiles than a regular Sling ... and give it some kind of Bayonnet on the tip so it doubles as a spear in case of charging cavalry
 
If there is the risk of "inflicting casualties on your own side if a grenade slips out of the sling and land among a packed infantry formation", perhaps those grenades could only be thrown by skirmishers out of our own packed infantry formations.

Imagine the reaction of the enemy army when your skirmishers begin to throw grenades at them. Of course they will try to kill your grenade skirmishers with gun skirmishers, but yours will do the same. Most battles could be won, before they even begin.

Uhm. So you send out 100 skirmishers, half of whom armed with sling grenades and half with muskets to keep enemy skirmishers at bay.

Before the sling grenade skirmishers reach a useful range to hit the enemy massed formation, the enemy skirmishers engage them. Say they commit 100 men, too.

Your own musket-armed skirmishers do the same with them. Given that an equal number of skirmishers is being employed, but half of yours are not armed with muskets, the musket-vs.-musket skirmish is 2:1 against your men.

Naturally, your sling grenade skirmishers may take part. But they will be using their grenades against those sparse targets, the enemy skirmishers, instead of against the ideal target: the enemy massed formations.

Even supposing they win the skirmish battle, thus gaining access to a useful range from the enemy massed formation, they will have used many of their grenades in the skirmish battle... and they can carry way less ammunition of that kind than an ordinary musket-armed skirmisher can carry musket balls.
 
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