User:Gwinva/Sandbox4

• Horses in warfare

Early notes, under headings chosen for my convenience. Winnowing and reorganisation for article comes later! Some information might be better suited to sub-articles, such as cavalry, Nap wars, etc.

Early modern general stuff

• NOT USED:

The ratio of footmen to horsemen increased over the period as the infantry weaponry improved, and footmen became more mobile and versatile, particularly once the musket bayonet had been adopted, replacing the more cumbersome pike.

Horses were a vital component of most armies in early modern Europe, and many instituted state studs for the breeding of horses for the military, but in wartime supply rarely matched the demand, resulting in some cavalry troops fighting on foot.

Post medieval: 16th 17th 18th C

During the Elizabethan period, British cavalry generally comprised three types: cuirassiers, heavily armoured and equipped with lances, light cavalry, who wore mail and bore light lances and pistols, and "petronels", who carried a early carbine.

By the English Civil War, the heavy cavalry had reduced (although the Scots retained their light cavalry), and armour was increasingly abandoned, so that dragoons became more common: mounted infantrymen whose main duties involved reconnaissance, escort and security. Dragoons' horses were smaller, and were rarely used in combat. Cavalry tactics also altered, with fewer mounted charges at pace, and more reliance on drilled manoeuvres undertaken at the trot, with the discharge of firearms once within range.

However, the heavy mounted charge was not made obsolete, with many generals making use of the tactic over the centuries, from the Duke of Marlborough, in the late 17th and early 18th centuries, who made great use of sword-wielding wedge-formation shock troops to penetrate enemy lines, to Napoleon in the early 19th century, who employed armoured heavy cuirassiers, and rated the cavalry as his most essential arm.[now, where did I just read that?]

• NOT DONE:

Horse artillery was also used with great success in India, although declined in use once ordnance became heavier.

• Use of horses by infantry officers

• Interesting statistics: Waterloo Campaign Armee du Nord had 47,000 horses: 25,000 cavalry, 12,000 for artillery, 10,000 for infantry and supply columns.

Turn of the century (1890s - WWI ish)

• NOT DONE:
• The cavalry charge became less frequent, but not ineffectual. At the Battle of Omdurman in 1898, the 21st lancers, a 400-strong regiment charged at and dispersed an infantry force of 2,500. REFERence: WP article for numbers; ref to "famous charge" at Omdurman (in which Winston Churchill rode) in Haythornthwaite Colonial p. 55.

WWI

Although cavalry was used with good effect in Palestine, at the Third Battle of Gaza and Battle of Megiddo in World War I, generally the mode of warfare changed, and the use of trench warfare, barbed wire and machine guns rendered traditional cavalry almost obsolete. Tanks were beginning to take over the role of shock combat. Following the war, armies became mechanised, with many cavalry regiments being converted to armoured divisions, with light tanks being developed to perform many of the cavalry's original roles.

One of the greatest cavalry charges in modern times occurred in 1917, during the Battle of Beersheba in Palestine, when two regiments of Light Horse from the Anzac Mounted Division successfully charged Turkish trenches. The regiments formed up over a wide area, to avoid offering a target for enemy artillery, and galloped 3 km into machine gun fire, equipped only with rifles and bayonets. While some of the front ranks fell to bullets, most of the horsemen broke through, jumping the trenches into the enemy camp. Some soldiers dismounted to fight in the trenches, while others raced on to Beersheba, to capture the town and the vital water supplies. The charge was "instrumental in securing Allenby's victory [in Palestine]".

Britain's cavalry were trained to fight both on foot and while mounted, but most other European cavalry still relied on shock action. There were isolated instances of successful shock combat on the Western Front, where cavalry divisions also provided important mobile fire power, but "cavalry was literally indispensable" on the Eastern front and Mesopotamia.

In 1917, Britain had over a million horses and mules in service, but harsh conditions, especially over winter, resulted in heavy losses, particularly amongst the Clydesdales, which drew the guns. Over the war, Britain lost almost half a million horses (one horse for every two men). [if you want figures, that's 484,000]

WWII

Both the Germans and the Russian maintained cavalry units throughout the war, which proved useful on the eastern front, where some shock action occurred.

Horses were used widely for transport. A German infantry division in Normandy in 1944 had 5,000 horses for such purposes. The only American cavalry unit during World War II was the 26th Cavalry – which included some Philippine Scouts – who offered resistance to the Japanese invaders of Luzon, Philippines, holding off two armoured and two infantry regiments during the invasion, and repelled a unit of tanks in Binalonan. They successfully held ground for the Allied armies' retreat to Bataan.

Post WW

• British Household Cavalry: ceremony, but also Royal guard and security duties

References

• {{cite encyclopedia |last= |first= |author= |authorlink= |coauthors= |editor=[[Richard Holmes |encyclopedia= |title= |url= |accessdate= |accessyear= |accessmonth= |edition= |date= |year= |month= |publisher= |volume= |location= |id= |isbn= |doi= |pages= |quote= }}
• Nofi, Albert A. (1993). The Waterloo Campaign: June 1815. USA: De Capo Press. ISBN 0938289985. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Haythornthwaite, Philip J. (1995). The Colonial Wars Source Book. London: Arms and Armour Press. ISBN 1854091964. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Kinloch, Terry (2005). Echoes of Gallipoli: In the Words of New Zealand's Mounted Riflemen. Auckland: Exisle Publishing. ISBN 0908988605. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Carver, Field Marshal Lord (1998). Britain's Army in the 20th Century. London: Macmillan. ISBN 0333737776. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Holmes, Richard (ed) (2001). The Oxford Companion to Military History. Oxford: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0198662092. {{cite book}}: |first= has generic name (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Carver, Field Marshal Lord (1984). The Seven Ages of the British Army. London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson. ISBN 0297783734. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Haythornthwaite, Philip J. (1987). British Infantry of the Napoleonic Wars. London: Arms and Armour Press. ISBN 0853688907. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Urwin, Gregory J. W. (1983). The United States Cavalry: An Illustrated History. Poole, UK: Blandford Books. ISBN 0713712198. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Mitchell, Elyne (1982). Light Horse: The Story of Australia's Mounted Troops. Melbourne: MacMillan. ISBN 0725103892. {{cite book}}: Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• Parker, Geoffrey (ed) (1995). Warfare: The Triumph of the West. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0521794315. {{cite book}}: |first= has generic name (help); Cite has empty unknown parameter: |coauthors= (help)
• {{cite book}}: Empty citation (help)

Various

Image:Gerreet secourant le vieux chevalier.jpg http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Category:15th_century_illuminated_manuscripts

Other topics, bits that don't fit, or useful for other articles

• Medieval men and women were only marginally shorter than their modern counterpart. The average height of an urban Englishman was 5'8" (1.72m). A woman was on average 5'2" (1.58m). The well-nourished knightly classes would exceed this average. Edward I of England was over 6'.
• In 732, Pope Gregory III banned the eating of horsemeat. This proscription was ignored, or forgotten, in most of Europe, but was observed in England throughout the Middle Ages, causing old horses to be almost worthless.
• French word haquenée (an ambling horse or hack)

arrows etc

• http://www.royalarmouries.org/extsite/view.jsp?sectionId=3006
• http://www.netsword.com/ubb/Forum3/HTML/000797.html

Mounted shock combat

It has been commonly understood that the introduction of the stirrup to Western Europe from the east led to the development of mounted shock warfare; particularly, the stirrup allowed the man-at-arms to couch his lance. This theory is assumed in many histories of medieval warfare. However, this theory has been questioned by recent research. (discuss mechanics of charge). One of the commonly-used pictorial evidence for a later development of mounted shock is the Bayeux tapestry, where the mounted combatants are seen wielding un-couched spears, suggesting to some historians that the spears were not couched at that stage of warfare. However, the tapestry depicts the melee (close-combat stage of a battle), when it would be impossible to wield a couched spear. A couched spear is only appropriate for attacking an enemy who is directly in front, not one who comes from the side, as the torque would be enough to knock the horseman out of his saddle. The style of fighting shown on the Bayeux tapestry is not primitive; the fifteenth-century fight master Hans Talhoffer pictures an almost identical stance in his treatise on fighting on horseback. Moreover, the ground at Hastings was not suitable for cavalry charges, suiting the deployment of small units of mounted men.

Interestingly, the word lance was not used until the fifteenth century, coinciding with the heavy spear (lance) developed for the tournament. By that time, the knight rarely fought as heavy cavalry on the battlefield, but dismounted to fight. During the (heyday) of mounted warfare, the lighter war-lance (or spear) was used, couched only for the initial charge.

The stirrup was developed in the east, where the mode of warfare relied on long, hard riding, and the use of missiles (eg arrows)... (complete)

development of saddle.

2

Destriers, in fact, were not very common, most knights and soldiers using cousers or rounceys. The Destrier, or great horse, was a middle-weight horse, similar to modern-day heavy hunters or show-jumping horses. . Horse armour, usually restricted to tournaments, comprised padded leather pieces, covered by a trapper (a decorated cloth), which is not particularly heavy.

There are literary references to horse armour (an "iron blanket") from the late twelfth century.

Medieval swords were in fact finely-made, well-balanced specimens, easily wielded by the experienced swordsman. They are similar in weight and size to the swords from the Renaissance, a fact confirmed by a study of the swords now currently held in the Wallace Collection, the Stibbert Museum, Florence, and the Royal Armouries.

Results of study of swords dated 9th-16th centuries:

sword type	grip length (cm)	sword length (cm)	weight (g)
Single-handed swords	~10	75-120	650-1400
Hand-and-a-half (bastard) swords	min. 15		800-1400
Two-handed swords	~20-45	max. 150	1500-2600

Note that the results were evenly distributed for length and weight throughout time period.

Cuir bouilli is hardened leather used for armour, horse-harnesses, boots and other household items. It is not boiled (which would destroy it) or oiled (which would soften it). It was in fact soaked in cold water, then dried (or heated) in a mould.

Consent -willingness to marry- was central to the concept of marriage, and if given under duress, the marriage was deemed invalid, as long as certain requirements were met, regarding the nature of the threats and the consummation (if any) of the marriage. Cruelty was grounds for dissolution, although reconciliation (and pledges from the guilty party) were encouraged.