Scissors, Rock, Paper

Friedland - Jean-Louis Ernest Meissonier
(Source)

The other day I mentioned in a comment that I was feeling the need to do a post about cavalry, men at war on horseback. But first I needed to check to see if I'd ever done a post specifically about cavalry. (At my age I tend to tell a story multiple times. Sometimes to the same audience. It's not that I don't know more stories, it's just that I'm not sure who I've told the stories to. Sigh...)

Seems I've done more than one post that dealt specifically with cavalry - here, here, and here. (You should go read them, I thought they were pretty good. Of course, YMMV.) So I thought I'd take a different tack with this post, which includes cavalry, naturellement.

You might be wondering about the title of today's post. "Scissors rock paper", a game known to most of us (I presume) and which is popular in other cultures as well. Imagine my surprise when my wife and her friends played this back when we were young. In Korean it's called 가위 바위 보. (Roughly ka-ee, ba-ee, bo.) Imagine my surprise last night when I looked that up to confirm the spelling (in Korean, my Korean is very rusty) and noted that here in the west the game is "rock paper scissors," because of the Korean connection, I've always referred to the game by the Korean order, which is "scissors rock paper." (I don't think the Chuck Norris option is available in Korea.)

Just in case you didn't get the reference above...

But yes, I digress, we're here to talk about the similarity of Napoleonic tactics to the old "rock scissors paper" game. (I read that somewhere and it has some truth to it.)

We know the game, "paper covers rock," which wins, "rock smashes scissors," which wins, and finally, "scissors cut paper," which wins. Three basic elements, each has its strength, each has its weakness.

The three basic combat arms on the Napoleonic battlefield were the infantry, the cavalry, and the artillery. Each had its strengths, each had its weaknesses. Balancing the three arms in battle was the task of the commander.

The Infantry
(Source)

The most numerous arm was the infantry. For the most part these men were equipped with a smoothbore, black powder, flintlock musket. Firing a lead ball over a half-inch in diameter (actual caliber varied from army to army) these weapons were wildly inaccurate at anything over fifty yards if you were actually aiming at something. So the infantry stood shoulder to shoulder and fired volleys at the enemy. When a hundred muskets are fired (all at once) in your general direction, someone or something is going to get hit. These weapons caused devastating wounds.

As the infantry was the most numerous, and was really the key to winning a battle, we'll primarily look at them. The infantry was very powerful. They formed upon the battlefield in three basic formations at the battalion level (think 400 to roughly a thousand men, grouped in four to ten companies, all depending on which army you are talking about).

For moving around the battlefield, battalions would be in column, usually one company across with the other companies stacked behind them, with enough room between companies to enable them to deploy into the other formations.

Column of companies
(French Shown)

This formation was very useful for movement on the field. The problem was that these big formations were very nice targets for these guys -

The Artillery
(Source)

Artillery was effective out to 1200 yards, for the larger guns. They were grouped in batteries of four to twelve pieces (as the individual cannon are known) and fired two basic types of ammunition: round shot (big metal ball) and canister (smaller metal balls backed in a tin).

Cannon were classified by the weight of their shot, typically four to twelve pounds. Believe me, you did not want to get hit by one of those things. Solid shot was used at the longer ranges, if the enemy got too close the gunners would switch to canister. The effect of which was a giant shotgun. Though short ranged they could tear an enemy formation to red rags in a hurry.

So the infantry needed to get across the field with some quickness, all the while being pounded by cannon fire. You'd think it might be impossible to survive, but most did. The real nastiness didn't start until you got close to the enemy, standing and waiting for you with loaded muskets. Typically deployed in line -

Standard three deep line.
Again, the French are depicted.
And yes it's a small drawing, otherwise it would stretch right across the page and beyond!

The Continental armies (France, Spain, Prussia, Austria, etc.) typically deployed in three-deep line, the British preferred two-deep, some sources say because it made all of the muskets effective in the battalion, some sources say it was so the usually smaller British armies could cover more ground. (I prefer the former theory.) It is true that in three-deep line the guys in that third line were more of a danger to their comrades in front of them than the enemy!

Okay, so you've made it across the field, leaving your path strewn with dead and wounded, now the preferred tactic before coming into musket range of your enemy was to deploy from column into line, thus maximizing your firepower. But while doing that, these guys might show up -

The Cavalry
(Source)

If you spotted them in time, you would want your battalion deployed in square -

Square formation, this is far more tidy here than on the field.
Often it looked more like a rectangle.
Again, it's a French battalion.

The first (outward) rank is kneeling, musket butt firmly on the ground held in place with a foot, bayonets forming a steel hedge around the formation. No, horses don't like steel hedges. The cavalry couldn't force their horses into the square, and it was tough to reach the guys in the square with your sword. The two ranks behind the kneeling rank would be trying to shoot the horsemen down.

Now if the cavalry fell back to regroup because they couldn't break the square, then the infantry were again exposed to cannon fire. And a square is a nice big juicy target. One ball can kill or maim as many as six men at a time. (Hit one face of the square, taking out three guys, then hit the backside of the square, taking out three more guys. No, hitting a human or two won't stop that metal ball. Might slow it down a bit, after taking out say ten men?)

So what do you do now battalion commander? Your square is getting chopped up by the cannon, if you don't do something, this could happen -

Cavalry cutting infantry to red ribbons.
(Source)

Well, if your commander planned things right, you don't have to worry about the enemy's cavalry because you brought your own along to counter-charge theirs. Then while the horsemen dash about swinging their swords at each other. You might deploy into line, the French would often stay in column and charge with the bayonet. Which was a long steel spike attached to the end of the infantry musket. You did not want to get stabbed with one of those.

It seldom came to crossing bayonets. One side or the other would say "fire truck" this and retreat. Usually the attacker had to launch multiple assaults in order to find a weakness in the other side's deployment. Sometimes there weren't enough cannon in a sector, sometimes a gap developed which the cavalry could charge through and start sabering the "in the rear with the gear" types.

Armies who let the enemy get behind them always got nervous and usually lost.

A very bloody game of "rock scissors paper" though obviously more complex.

Infantry who were tired or who had suffered under cannon fire might just throw down their muskets and run away. While that might seem like a good idea, cavalrymen liked nothing better than sabering fleeing infantry.

Really good infantry would stand their ground regardless of losses. You almost had to push them over after shooting them. There were infantry units in the Napoleonic Wars who would continue to fight against all odds.

Some would run away at the first shot.

It was all about getting the right troops, in the right formation, at the right time, in the right place which won battles. Sometimes all it took was a single cavalry squadron showing up in the rear and panicking the reserves which could make an entire army flee.

Sometimes the two sides would pound each other all day with no apparent result. One side might slip away in the night to fight another day, sometimes a battle would last into a second or even a third day, though that was very rare.

Once the battle was won, and perhaps even the war, then for the lucky ones it was back to home and hearth.

(Source)

War is never as pretty as the paintings make it seem.



Yes, I left out a lot of things, howitzers, rifles, rockets, lions, and tigers, and bears. Oh my.