Army Group

“ But if every private soldier of the Union could have been advanced according to his deserts, we should have had an army composed almost entirely of major generals. There were thousands upon thousands of men in the ranks, as brave, as true, as skillful, and as devoted, as many who commanded divisions and corps; and if these could not all be promoted it was only because, as I once heard a schoolboy captain demonstrate to his discontented company, “All cannot be corporals.” ”

“ The whole army, of every branch—infantry, artillery, and cavalry—was drawn up in columns of regiments, brigades, and divisions, in large open fields, General Lee and his staff riding along the lines of each command, and then all marched by the reviewing station, showing by the steady and firm step and soldierly bearing that they were not disheartened, but ready to go whenever their trusted and beloved commander might point the way. ”

“ To-day, generals commanding armies rather search for honour in the field of duty—duty accomplished, orders obeyed. These simple formulæ have always been the watchwords of the soldier-unit, whether that unit be a man, a platoon, a company or a regiment. Now, with the limitless increase in the size of armaments, a unit may well be an Army Corps, or even a combination of Army Corps, and the highest aim of the general officer commanding such a unit must be—as of old—fulfilment of duty, obedience to orders. ”

“ The Military Forces of the Great Powers have now grown so large that a further development of organization has become necessary. They are therefore divided in war into separate Armies. Army, in this new sense, does not mean, as it used to, the whole Force, for which, indeed, some other49 word than “Army” is urgently needed. An Army is simply the highest Unit in the organization of a great host in the field. ”

“ Inasmuch as the Regular Army will naturally form the standard of organization for any increase or for new regiments of volunteers, it becomes important to study this subject in the light of past experience, and to select that form which is best for peace as well as war. ”

“ I ordered the army corps organization not only on the unanimous opinion of the twelve Generals of division, but also on the unanimous opinion of every military man I could get an opinion from, and every modern military book, yourself only excepted. Of course I did not on my own judgment pretend to understand the subject. I now think it indispensable for you to know how your struggle against it is received in quarters which we cannot entirely disregard. It is looked upon as merely an effort to pamper one or two pets, and to persecute and degrade their supposed rivals. ”

“ But more than grouping battalions of the regular army together is the uniting in one common bond the other parts of our fighting strength. The addition of militia to the regiment, and of the volunteers to the same, both promotes a real and wider esprit de corps, and facilitates recruiting in every way. ”

“ The number of men in a regiment was fixed by Congress, as well as in a company—so many infantry, cavalry, and artillery. But the eternal ebb and flow of men engaged for three, six, and nine months, who went and came every day, rendered it impossible to have either a regiment or a company complete; and the words company, regiment, brigade, and division, were so vague that they did not convey any idea upon which to form a calculation, either of a particular corps or of the army in general. ”

“ The army corps—managing its own internal affairs—having its adjutancy, its auditoriat, and its intendancy to supply its needs with the assistance of and in connection with the ministry of war—is a body easily amenable to the strategical direction proceeding from a general centre. Thus the growth of the organ of strategical direction was necessarily accompanied by a corresponding development of other military institutions by which the perfect adaptability of the organism to the directing agency was attained and preserved. ”

“ In time of peace it has been our historical policy to administer these units separately by a geographical organization. In other words, our Army in time of peace has never been a united organization but merely scattered groups of companies, battalions, and regiments, and the first task in time of war has been to create out of these scattered units an Army fit for effective teamwork and cooperation. ”

“ One committee, originally charged with defining the missions of the National Guard and the Organized Reserves, widened its task to encompass the Regular Army. The committee delineated four missions for the regulars: form an expeditionary force in an emergency; furnish troops for foreign and coastal defense garrisons; provide personnel to develop and train the reserve components; and supply the administrative overhead of the Army. ”

“ To these must be added the Royal Engineers, the Army Service Corps, the Royal Ordnance Department, the R.A.M.C., the Army Pay Corps, and other non-combatant units necessary to the domestic and general internal working of an army. To-day these various forces are increased to such an extent that no man outside the War Office can tell the strength of infantry, cavalry, and artillery ”

“ The fighting troops of the Division necessarily occupy the chief place in the narrative, but it must be remembered throughout that the achievements of these troops would have been impossible without the co-operation of the Royal Army Service Corps, Army Ordnance Corps and Army Veterinary Corps units, and the good work of the Field Ambulances and stretcher-bearers. ”

“ Much of the responsibility for organizing and training combat units, formerly held by the G-3, was passed to Army Ground Forces (AGF) , and the Operations Division (OPD) , formerly the War Plans Division, focused on the employment of units. ”

“ The British organization is so planned that the Force can be readily divided, when required, into two Armies, each of which can be provided with its proportion of Strategic and Protective Cavalry, and of Army Troops, without disorganizing and rearranging those Formations. ”

“ The organization of the several corps composing the Army is such as to admit its expansion to a great extent in case of emergency, the officers carrying with them all the light which they possess to the new corps to which they might be appointed. ”

“ The manoeuvres of divisions and army corps serve to accustom the three arms to act in concert, and to overcome the great friction which at first always impedes the movements of such large composite bodies. All the various manoeuvres, moreover, give the superior officers the opportunity of inspecting the work of their inferiors, that is, of ascertaining how far the training of the troops has been thorough, and with what degree of skill they are handled. ”

“ Cadre Force, consisting of the General and Instructional Staff, a regiment of Artillery, small detachments of Engineers, Army Service Corps, Ordnance Corps, and of Army Medical Corps, for partially garrisoning the naval strategical bases, for technical duties, for maintenance of valuable stores and equipment, and, above all, for the instruction of the Militia and Volunteer forces during peace and for stiffening them in times of war. ”

“ They necessarily had to learn pretty thoroughly the army regulations, with the methods and forms of making returns and conducting business with the adjutant-general's office, with the ordnance office, the quartermaster's and subsistence departments, etc. In this ready knowledge of the army organization and its methods their advantage over the new volunteer officers was more marked, as it seemed to me, than in any and all other things. The routine of army business and the routine of drill had to be learned by every army officer. ”

“ At the conclusion of the training of units—regiments, battalions, and brigades of artillery—brigade and divisional training is begun, and then manœuvres follow, in which the troops are given opportunities of learning the working of an army corps, as well as getting practical experience of camp life under conditions as near those obtaining on active service as circumstances will admit. ”

“ To improve mobilization the law required that the Army, as far as practical, be organized into brigades, divisions, and army corps, with the brigades and divisions perpetuating those that had served in the war. ”

“ The Army as organized must be the nucleus around which in every time of need the strength of your military power, the sure bulwark of your defense—a national militia—may be readily formed into a well-disciplined and efficient organization. ”

“ From the good accounts that I have received of the Division, I am confident that the high traditions of the British Army are safe in your hands, and that with your comrades now in the Field you will maintain the unceasing efforts necessary to bring the War to a victorious ending. ”

“ Large numbers of untrained men, without organization to embody them in, add little to actual military strength.
Armies of First Line
The Army which will take the field at the outbreak of war is the Regular Army, which is organized, kept up, and trained, year by year, in peace. The War Army will be this Peace Army mobilized, or brought up to war strength and completed in every essential, by calling up reserve officers and men to fill its ranks. ”

“ However capable divisions, battalions, and companies may be as units, success would be impossible unless they worked together. A well organized General Staff trained for war has not hitherto existed in our army. Under the Commander in Chief this staff must carry out the policy of the army as a whole and direct all the details of its preparation, support, and operation. As models to aid us, we had the veteran French General Staff and the experience of the British who had formed a staff to meet the demands of a great army. ”

“ They represent the supreme sacrifice in the interests of the national honour of what was familiarly known as our "regular army." Since the outbreak of the war, fresh armies have arisen, of new and unprecedented proportions. The members of these new armies are as familiar now to the public eye as the representatives of the old regular army are scarce. ”

“ Field operations usually involved less than a regiment or were conducted by gathering the geographically closest elements of several regiments on a temporary basis. Army Regulations, nevertheless, continued to repeat the ideas for organizing army corps, divisions, and brigades, with the division described as "the fundamental element and basis of organization of every active army." ”

“ The Army will for the first time be associated with an Ally to whom it has been the lot of the British nation to be opposed in the field for many centuries.
“The gallantry and high military qualities of the French Army are matters of history, and the alliance which has now been formed, will, the Commander of the Forces trusts, be of long duration, as well as productive of the most important and the happiest consequences. ”

“ The common soldiers had made up their minds that they could not leave the struggle for the Army's rights wholly in the hands of the officers, and that it might assist these officers if they, the rank and file, with the corporals and sergeants, formed an organization among themselves for the same ends. ”

“ With 486,000 men in the National Guard, the committee envisioned forming eighteen Guard infantry divisions, two for each corps area, and three or more Guard cavalry divisions, at least one for each army area. For the Organized Reserves, twenty-seven infantry divisions were contemplated, three per corps area, and three or more cavalry divisions, at least one for each army area. ”

“ The numbers of Units and of Lesser Formations grouped together, and their proportion to each other, are dictated by past experience and a forecast of future fighting requirements.
The bodies thus formed constitute what are called the Subordinate Commands of the Army. They are self-contained, and capable of independent existence and action—existence, because they have the necessary Administrative Services to supply their wants; action, because, having considerable strength, and a proper proportion of all Arms, they can fight for a certain time without support from other bodies of troops. ”

“ These, with medical and other units, made a total of over 28,000 men, or practically double the size of a French or German division. Each corps would normally consist of six divisions—four combat and one depot and one replacement division—and also two regiments of cavalry, and each army of from three to five corps. With four divisions fully trained, a corps could take over an American sector with two divisions in line and two in reserve, with the depot and replacement divisions prepared to fill the gaps in the ranks. ”

“ To coordinate all the activities within an army corps, supporting staffs grew at each level—corps, division, brigade, and regiment. Eventually an adjutant, commissaries of muster and subsistence, and a chief of ordnance comprised the divisional staff. The staff for the brigade included an adjutant, quartermaster, commissary of subsistence, and, when the brigade served as an independent command, an ordnance officer. In addition, general officers continued to have aides as their personal staff. ”

“ In this way the whole movement is kept in touch, and its power can be focused upon any object. You have a similar type of organisation in the army, where the soldiers are grouped in companies of 100 with their immediate officers through whom they are kept in proper relation with the other companies in the regiment. ”

“ Each army area supported one Guard and two Reserve cavalry divisions, and each corps area maintained one Regular, two Guard, and three Reserve infantry divisions, all to be sustained by combat support and combat service support units to be perfected later. ”

“ The general commanding deems it proper at this time to inform the officers and men of the Fourteenth, Fifteenth, Seventeenth, and Twentieth Corps, that he has organized them into an army for a special purpose, well known to the War Department and to General Grant. It is sufficient for you to know that it involves a departure from our present base, and a long and difficult march to a new one. All the chances of war have been considered and provided for, as far as human sagacity can. ”