Battering ram

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ To defeat the attacks of the ram, men have sometimes filled large bags with hay or straw and lowered them with light iron chains in front of the ram where it sought to pierce the wall. It sometimes happens that the shots fall so rapidly upon a fortress that the defenders are unable to remain at the battlements; it is then advisable to hang out brattices made of light planks and built high enough to reach two ells above the openings in the parapet and three ells below them. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Even amid the booming of the anti-aircraft batteries and the sharper staccato reports of the machine guns from various parts of the field, all blending into an unearthly din, the droning of the motors high in the air could be distinctly heard. Like a pyrotechnic display, luminous bullets, searching for the invaders, shot up into the sky, often piercing the low-hanging clouds; and mingling in with them were vicious little spurts of fire which told of the explosion of shrapnel shells. ”

“ 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. ”

“ 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. ”

“ Reclining there under a tree while the skirmishing is going on in front and the shells are tearing up the sod around us, I observe how evidently hard pressed is that battery yonder in the edge of the wood, about fifty yards to our right. The enemy's batteries have excellent range on the poor fellows serving it. And when the smoke lifts or rolls away in great clouds for a moment, we can see the men running, and ramming, and sighting, and firing, and swabbing, and changing position every few minutes to throw the enemy's guns out of range a little. ”

“ At this moment, from the breach opposite the battery on the plain, descended, or rather rolled down, supported by ropes, a horseman on a white horse, who immediately leaped over the half-filled ditch, dashed to the left between the batteries, flew over the intrenchments, over the soldiers dozing behind them, who neither expected nor guessed any thing like this, and, followed by their hasty shouts, plunged into the woods. ”

“ One of the batteries (Q) , which was upon the outside of the three-banked rows of waggons, halted at the spruit, dashed off, following Roberts’s Horse to the rear and south. Yet most of them got clear, although horses and men fell at every step, and the guns were being dragged off with only part of their teams, animals falling wounded by the way. Then I saw the battery, when but 1200 yards from the spruit, wheel round into firing position, unlimber, and go into action at that range, so as to save comrades and waggons from capture. ”

“ There is no meaner mode of shooting than from a battery. In attaining destructiveness, every idea of beauty, comfort, or sportsmanship is sacrificed. The shooter lies on his back in a species of coffin sunk to the level of the water, with his decoys near by; and whenever a flock approaches, he rises to a sitting posture and fires. He cannot leave his battery nor move it, nor hardly turn round in it, and is unable to retrieve his ducks without the aid of an assistant. It is an invention suited solely to the market-gunner, and utterly unfitted to the sportsman. ”

“ Should we be involved, our field artillery must pave the way with the dead bodies of the enemy before our infantry can advance. Also, the batteries of the enemy must be silenced by our own batteries before they, with their gun-fire, shall be able to silence ours. Other things being equal, therefore, it is the number of field batteries that, more than anything else, turns the tide of battle for defeat or victory. If the enemy's guns have a longer range than ours, then they will be able to silence our batteries while far beyond the range of our guns. ”

“ 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. ”

“ The position was on the west of a gentle rise, that inclined slightly to our rear. Had infantry charged our front, a few steps forward, would have enabled us to sweep the field. A Federal rifle battery, fired at us for a while, where we lay on the ground barely covered from their fire, when one of the shells skimmed the crest of the hill, it would miss our back a foot or two and pass on with no damage to us. ”

“ Rammer, or Ramrod of a gun, the ramrod or gunstick; a rod used in charging a gun, to drive home the powder and shot, as also the wad, which keeps the shot from rolling out. The rammer of a piece of artillery, is a cylinder of wood, whose diameter and length are each equal to the diameter of the shot, with a handle fixed to it, at the end of which is another cylinder, covered with lamb-skin, so as to fit the gun exactly, and called a sponge: it is used to clean the piece before and after it is fired. The ramrod of a musquet is one entire piece of iron. ”

“ The machine guns must not be re-horsed until after the battery has limbered up and moved off, as they are then most vulnerable. They should endeavour to come into action before the battery unlimbers—though this will seldom be possible with horse artillery. ”

“ The Chicago Board of Trade battery is silenced. The shot roll up the Murfreesboro pike like balls on a bowling alley. Many horses are killed. A soldier near me, while walking deliberately to the rear, to seek a place of greater safety, is struck between the shoulders by a ricochetting ball, and in [207] stantly killed. We are ordered to be in readiness to repel an attack, and form line of battle amid this fearful storm of iron. Gaunther and Loomis get their batteries in position, and, after twenty or thirty minutes' active work, silence the enemy and compel him to withdraw. ”

“ Lumsden gave him time to get up to the rifle battery, and then came his command: "Cannoneers to your posts!" Each gunner was told where to aim, and the estimated distance. Then: "Load! Battery ready! Fire!" Those Yankees opened on our four-gun battery, with twenty-four guns and the dirt was soon flying over and around us. We fired rapidly and so did the rifle battery, but directly a shell came through number 3 embrasure, killed Gurley, standing erect with thumb on vent, plunged into caisson just behind and exploded all three chests thereon. ”

“ An attack, on a large scale, was planned, the object being to drive the enemy down the slope of the hill into the low-lying country beyond. Field batteries were moved up into forward positions, in order to assist the infantry, by placing a creeping barrage—a new and most successful invention, afterwards employed on all occasions—in front of the advancing waves of men: and the “heavies,” of which, for the first time, we possessed a preponderance, pounded the enemy communications far behind his lines. ”

“ But artillery must have a good "position." Batteries cannot be hidden behind boulders as infantry soldiers can. Gunners must have an open field and more or less a commanding point from which to lay their guns. This necessity—a necessity to which no other arms are so completely subjected—has entailed, during the course of the present war, the risk of whole batteries being under rifle fire. Before the introduction of the long-range rifle, there were but few instances where guns, in order to take up proper positions, were forced to come under effective rifle fire. ”

“ They worked in the close neighbourhood of death, and at any moment, between one round and another, a battery and its gun teams might be blown up by one of those howling beasts which seem to gather strength and ferocity at the end of their flight before the final roar of destruction. Now and again a lucky shell of the enemy's gets an ammunition dump, and a high torch rises to the dark sky, and in its flames there are wild explosions as the shells are touched off. ”

“ I could see the whole line of batteries on either side. Boats with muffled oars were moving on the river. Murmuring sounds came through the stillness from the British shore. Suddenly, in the calm stillness of the deep night, the whole line of batteries opened a rapid and continuous fire. Cannon sent their iron hail crashing among the trees, rockets went blazing and roaring across the dark river, and shells went hissing high into the air, their track made distinctly visible by the blazing fuze, until they burst above, or in the forest. The rebel batteries were not silent. ”

“ Meanwhile accept my congratulations on the great skill and foresight which your ram-design displays."
Collisions at sea unhappily afford ample evidence of the fatal efficiency of the ramming principle. Even ironclad ships have not been able to withstand the destructive effect. The Vanguard and the Kurfurst now lie at the bottom of the sea in consequence of an accidental "end-on" ram from a heavy ship going at a moderate velocity. High speed in a Steam Ram is only desirable when the attempt is made to overtake an enemy's ship ”

“ 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. ”

“ Every moment or two the ground shook with the recoil and thunder of our batteries, while the air above and around us seemed literally filled with shrieking, moaning, whistling projectiles of almost every size and pattern in present use. From them came puffs of smoke, sharp cracks, heard above the general din, as they exploded and showered around us pieces of jagged iron. When a shell bursts, its fragments strike the ground obliquely, with a forward movement; therefore our comparative safety behind our rock, which often shook from the terrific impact of missiles on its outer side. ”

“ As a rule, each battery makes a second or alternative gun position, in case it should be shelled out of its existing one, so that no delay takes place in getting into action again. When night fell there was subdued excitement in the wagon line as the time drew near to take the guns “in.” This was actually the beginning of our first venture—would we have the luck to get there without being caught in the enemy’s harassing fire? How would we behave under shell-fire: would we be steady or otherwise? ”

“ This served to remind us to be discreet and to run no risks by exposing ourselves in the slightest degree above the parapet. Sometimes it is very difficult to restrain one’s enthusiasm when there is an interesting shoot taking place.
The pieces being duly registered, the Battery is now ready for any emergency, and theoretically we can engage any target in our arc of fire. It is then essential to learn the country in hostile territory, and one looks out for likely targets and for points at which one can inconvenience the enemy by keeping him under constant harassing fire. ”