Assault and battery

“ The battery had taken position in line from column under an infantry fire from an entire division at ranges of from 200 to 400 yards. Shells from the rebel artillery were also crashing through our line. We opened fire at first with shell. This shell fire proved so effective that a rebel assault on the battery was ordered. A division of Price’s army rushed to the charge. The battery changed from shell to double charges of canister. The effect of the canister was [Pg 9] terribly increased because of the rebel method of charging in masses. ”

“ But the night coming on, the French surceased their fury, and yet kept themselves closely, under the top of the breach, where our shot nor flankers could do them no harm: for all our great ordnance was dismounted, long before the enemy made any approach for the giving of an assault.
The next day [the 19th of January] , within three half hours, the battery had beaten the breach so bare (it moulded away, like a hillock of sand) that we [reduced now to about 300 men] were forced to fight on our knees. ”

“ We received their fire from the north, south, and west of the redoubt, completely enfilading our ditches and rendering it almost impracticable for a man to expose his person above the parapet. An effort was made to carry our works by assault; but the battery (Twelfth Missouri) was so ably manned, and so gallantly fought, as to render it impossible for a column to live within a hundred yards of the work. Officers labored constantly to stimulate the men to expose themselves above the parapet, and nobly set them the example. ”

“ Treason, murder, manslaughter, sexual battery, carjacking, home/invasion robbery, robbery, burglary, arson, kidnapping, aggravated assault, aggravated battery, aggravated stalking, aircraft piracy, unlawful throwing/placing or discharging of a destructive device or bomb, and any other felony which involves the use or threat of physical force or violence against any individual. ”

“ The battery hurled out its stream of death in absolute immunity. No enemy shell came to seek it. The fog veiled its target.
Beyond that battery was another, in the open like the first, almost wheel to wheel with it. And beyond that, another and yet others, an endless chain of them, all scorning concealment, all firing as fast as sweating, straining men could load and pull the lever. From behind came the prolonged, heavy, linked detonations of yet other batteries of more weighty metal. Overhead the rumble and rush of hurrying shells was as the sound of heavy traffic. ”

“ As the masses of the enemy advanced the battery opened with canister at short range, mowing down the rebels by scores, until, with every officer killed or wounded and nearly every man and horse killed or disabled, it fell an easy prey. ”

“ They advanced with great determination, in spite of the destructive grape fire maintained by the three guns of the battery. Undoubtedly had the batteries been placed together on that side, as on the one at which it was thought probable that the attack would be made, the insurgents might have been repulsed, but it would [Pg 290] have needed a much larger force than that in the town to man all those batteries. ”

“ In the French Revolution, the Chouans of La Vendée attacked the Republican batteries in several single files, of one or two hundred men each, at intervals of fifty paces. Such a formation protects the attacking columns, to a great extent, from the enemy's fire, but exposes them to destruction by a charge from the battery supports. ”

“ One may walk along that line of heights for mile after mile, and find there only grim ranges of batteries and waiting groups of men. All is silence; all is alertness; all is fog. Back of the lines of unlimbered cannon, sheltered as far as possible from returning fire, the drivers and horses and the heavy-laden caissons are shrouded in the mist-veil, and the staff officers, groping to and fro, have to ask their way from battery to battery, or go yards beyond their real objective point. Little fires are burning here and there, and battery-lanterns are flickering in the gloom. ”

“ Half a battalion was ordered down to the water’s edge, and the effect of their fire against these guns was soon appreciated by the soldiers in the batteries; the cannonade of the enemy lost its effect, their fire became irregular, their shot passed over our heads, and finally they were compelled to limber up their park of artillery, and retrace their steps, at a gallop, up the Christoval height. Nevertheless, this battery did an incalculable hurt to us; many men were struck down by its fire, but, above all, our engineers suffered the most. ”

“ A break in the wire is discovered and speedily mended, the next attempt is successful, and the battery is called to action.
During registration the wire often breaks, and serious delays occur, but, at length, the last gun is duly pronounced O.K. by the officer. Just in the nick of time, too! for the enemy commences a sharp retaliation on the portion of the trench occupied by the little party. Refuge is sought in an old enemy shaft close by, and there it awaits the time for the “show” to commence. ”

“ At about 11 o'clock the battery formed in a new position on an elevated piece of ground, and whenever the rebels undertook to cross the field in front of them the artillery raked them down with frightful slaughter. Several times the rebels placed batteries In the timber at the farther end of the field, but in each instance the guns of the First battery dislodged them before they could get into position. For hours the rebels vainly endeavored to break the lines of the Union forces, but in every instance they were repulsed with frightful loss, the canister mowing them down at close range. ”

“ It cannot be doubted that earthen batteries, with guns in barbette, can, as a general rule, be more easily taken by assault, that they are more exposed to vertical and ricochet firing, and more expose their gunners to be picked off by sharpshooters. ”

“ They must see and report every little thing which happened in the enemy's [Pg 161] lines, no small detail must be omitted. The number and colours of his signal lights on different occasions, the relative activity of his different batteries and their positions, the movement of his transport, the location of his mortars and machine guns, the trench reliefs, all these must be watched. The immediate purpose was of course retaliation, counter battery work, the making of our bombardments more effective by picking out the tender spots in his lines, and generally harassing the enemy ”

“ The sight was truly awful!—In the midst of this convulsion Colonel Pack, with a party of his own regiment, the 71st, the 36th, and the German Legion, assaulted a battery which the enemy had constructed on the left of the town, and which did considerable execution among our men. Availing himself of a few moments of darkness, he advanced at the head of his column to the very mouths of the guns! The next moment the discharge of a huge rocket shed over the whole battery a red light, and just as the assailants were clambering up its sides. ”

“ More batteries had evidently come into action. Coalescing all individual sounds the general clamour of the battle swelled in surges of hideous noise from one deep-toned, continuous roar. The subaltern became habituated to it, scarcely noticed it.
Happening to look round he saw a howitzer battery coming into the field. A few minutes later the regular sequence of its detonations told him it had got to work. It was evident that troops were being hurried up to meet the threatened attack. Along the hill-side to the right a line of infantry was strung out, [Pg 14] advancing towards the wood. ”

“ Another brigade lay next to us; in fact one of their batteries had occupied a position intended for our C Battery. The shell fell with a blinding crash among their horses, which they had kept near the guns in readiness for the morning; and for half an hour the darkness was pierced by the cries and groans of wounded men, and the sound of revolvers putting horses out of their pain. Four drivers had been killed and twenty-nine horses knocked out. "A lucky escape for us," was the grim, not unsympathetic comment of C Battery. ”

“ They had twenty-four guns in position against our single battery, and were able to enfilade our line, as well as to pound us by their direct fire. It was one of the greatest errors of the early days of the Confederacy that batteries were allowed to be knocked to pieces in detail, when, by massing a dozen batteries, the enemy could have been knocked quickly out of time and many lives saved. A solid shot bowled past me, killed one of our men, tore a leg and arm from another, and threw three [49] horses into a bloody, struggling heap. ”

“ These batteries drew not only the artillery file of the enemy, but they furnished a point for the concentrated fire of all the infantry in front. To be in supporting position was to receive all the bullets that were aimed at the battery, and which, of course, usually vexed the rear. The shells intended for the battery in your front have a habit always of flying too high or bursting just high enough in air to make it pleasant for the troops who are held in comparative inactivity. ”

“ In the first case, the shock the body endures, is general, uniform, and therefore less fierce; in the other, a single part, a neck, or ear perchance, is attacked, and that with the greater violence probably, as it is done by a successive stream of cold air. And the cannon of a battery, pointed against a single part of a bastion, will easier make a breach than were they directed to play singly upon the whole face, and will admit the enemy much sooner into the town. ”

“ More than five men out of every six.
The statistics compiled by Col. Fox in his “Regimental Losses in the American Civil War,” show that this day’s record in killed and mortally wounded equaled, within one, the total killed in any light battery during its entire term of service. This work also states that the losses of the Eleventh at Iuka were 22% greater than those sustained by any other light battery in any one engagement during the war. ”

“ The subaltern turned to look at what he believed to be the wreckage of his battery. It was littered with dead and dying men. A wagon lay on its side, was being righted as he looked at it. Men pulled away a body from underneath. Every vehicle in the line, guns and wagons, was pock-marked with splashes of lead. The shield of one gun had been neatly perforated by a shell and the crew of that gun lay about it as they had been dispersed by the explosion. Their clothes were still on fire. The subaltern was staring stupidly at them when the lieutenant who never carried cigarettes approached. ”

“ Owing to smokeless powder, batteries of artillery are more exposed to the fire both of the enemy's artillery and of sharpshooters. A hundred sharpshooters at a distance of half a mile can, it is estimated, put a battery out of action in less than two minutes and a half. Let it be added that the high explosives used by modern artillery are extremely liable to explode, owing to being struck by the enemy, or owing to concussion caused by an enemy's shell, or to mishandling. ”

“ Batteries having, under great difficulties, been erected on the right bank, immediately opposite to, and about six hundred yards from the American fort, which had been recently and hurriedly constructed, a heavy and destructive fire was, on the morning of the third day, opened from them, supported by the gun boats, one of which, commanded by Gerald Grantham, had advanced so close to the enemy's position as to have diverted upon herself the fire which would else have been directed to the demolition of a British battery, hastily thrown up on the left bank. ”

“ Again you fly back toward the enemy's position, circling in this way backward and forward between the battery and the target until the réglage is completed. Naturally every care must be taken not to disclose the position of your own guns to the enemy, or retaliation—"strafe," the English call it—summarily follows. Sometimes it is the battery which interrupts the work with the signal, "Avion ennemi," when the fire instantly ceases until the German aeroplane has disappeared or been driven off. ”

“ When possible to avoid it, a field battery should not be opposed to a battery of position, or, generally, a battery of light guns to one of heavy guns. For even when the numbers of pieces on the two sides are equal, the enemy's superiority in range and in weight of metal would give him such advantage in the duel that our own battery would soon be destroyed or silenced. ”

“ The way the guns kept pounding away at it made me think of firemen in a small town drenching a local blaze with their hose. The gunners were just so eager as that. And I could almost see that factory, crumbling away. Major Normabell had pointed it out to me, up on the ridge, and now I knew why. I'll venture to say that before night the eight-inch howitzers of that battery had utterly demolished it, and so ended whatever usefulness it had had for the Germans. ”

“ About five o'clock a horseman was seen to ride over the hill from which the rebel battery had shelled us in the morning, followed almost immediately by the teams of a battery, and rapidly making the left about, drop their pieces into battery, but before they had fired a shot, twenty-nine projectiles of various kinds and sizes were flying towards that unfortunate battery, creating, a few seconds later, the greatest consternation, as they exploded among the pieces and limbers ”

“ Many changes of battery positions were made, and, whenever possible, we burrowed down into the ground, as the enemy’s heavy pieces were out after our blood. The great concentration of guns and the few suitable localities for placing them in action added to our difficulties, and we were thus rendered an easy target for the hostile counter batteries. Innumerable brigades were huddled close together, in what was known as the Death Valley, for the simple reason that there was no other suitable spot wherein to place them, and heavy casualties resulted. ”