Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

1. Who is the first nation on earth to introduce the concepts of mobile artillery? France?
2. When was the first time the 'Horse Artillery' unit introduced, the first battle this unit made a field test and its successful rate? .. i'm not sure if Napoleon introduced this but since he started his career as artillery officier. he had 'experimented' with various artillery tactics. i've heard that he introduced 'flying artillery' tactics. which is. a battery very small, quick set-up, light cannons (one that fires 1 pound ammo or smaller :p) deployed somewhere that can hit the enemy line inf. formations and do the most damage, do a few salvo and hitch the cannons elsewhere, re deploy and fire at the same or different targets. ... correct?
another successful operators of horse artillery was the U.S. Army, in mexican wars. there was a battle that a formation of horse artillery decimated a larger enemy formations with ease. can't remember the name.
3. About Cugnot steam carriage


the footage (this one is an american-made replica originated in the motown, Detroit. yes it was once belonged to France) showed that the Cugnot 'fardier' works. but it's very slow and it seems to have no brakes.
3.1 is this the highest speed this vehicle can do? if so no wonder why no one, not even French army use it in any battles. slower than horse limbers.
3.2 looks like it is designed to be self-propelled artillery, correct?
3.3 how fast is its setup time?
3.4 Why no one else in Europe developed the similar vehicles out of Cugnot thing? not even Napoleon has any interest in this machine, did he? can't it be developed to be faster than horse?

Lone Cat wrote:3.4 Why no one else in Europe developed the similar vehicles out of Cugnot thing? not even Napoleon has any interest in this machine, did he? can't it be developed to be faster than horse?

It is in every way inferior to a horse drawn artillery. Yes it can be developed to be faster than a horse.



But how much time do you have to get there?

There is also the rocketry side of the house that actually may predate the tube artillery side.


To this now.

The Romans used ballistae mounted on mule and ox drawn carts.

I'd answer, but something tells me someone wants us to do their homework for them.

MLRS is so 20th century.

Scariest video I have ever seen was of American artillery (I think it was USMC) unloading on some poor city in Iraq at night from like 10 miles out. My god, those weapons are powerful.

Lone Cat wrote:1. Who is the first nation on earth to introduce the concepts of mobile artillery? France?

That depends on how you define 'mobile' artillery. THe first example of a self-propelled gun is British, but that's really a mechanization of the older horse artillery concept. The artillery of today is a continuation of the light artillery concepts that were first put to actual use during the American Civil War, and famously used by the Prussians to defeat France in the Franco-Prussian War. I'm currently reading a book about the evolution of operational warfare. I'll jump ahead and see what the author says about artillery development in the 19th century cause that's the time period I think we're looking at.

Although given your frequent interest in the development of warfare you might want to pick up a copy for yourself: The Art of War in the Western World, Archer Jones. University of Illinois Press. 2000.

Jones is one of the leaders in the history of warfare in the world today bridging the gap between the military sciences and history. He might be right up your alley.

2. When was the first time the 'Horse Artillery' unit introduced, the first battle this unit made a field test and its successful rate? .. i'm not sure if Napoleon introduced this but since he started his career as artillery officier. he had 'experimented' with various artillery tactics. i've heard that he introduced 'flying artillery' tactics. which is. a battery very small, quick set-up, light cannons (one that fires 1 pound ammo or smaller :p) deployed somewhere that can hit the enemy line inf. formations and do the most damage, do a few salvo and hitch the cannons elsewhere, re deploy and fire at the same or different targets. ... correct?

As a concept? I think it goes back to the Napoleonic wars, but as a fully realized concept (as in put into practical application) you probably have to jump to the American Civil War.

3. About Cugnot steam carriage


the footage (this one is an american-made replica originated in the motown, Detroit. yes it was once belonged to France) showed that the Cugnot 'fardier' works. but it's very slow and it seems to have no brakes.
3.1 is this the highest speed this vehicle can do? if so no wonder why no one, not even French army use it in any battles. slower than horse limbers.
3.2 looks like it is designed to be self-propelled artillery, correct?
3.3 how fast is its setup time?
3.4 Why no one else in Europe developed the similar vehicles out of Cugnot thing? not even Napoleon has any interest in this machine, did he? can't it be developed to be faster than horse?

I know little of it, but as a general rule military minds tend to be very orthodox and conservative in their thinking. It can take them awhile to catch up to advances in technology and culture. Often times militaries only make leaps forward when necessity demands it.

George Spiggott wrote:

Lone Cat wrote:3.4 Why no one else in Europe developed the similar vehicles out of Cugnot thing? not even Napoleon has any interest in this machine, did he? can't it be developed to be faster than horse?

It is in every way inferior to a horse drawn artillery. Yes it can be developed to be faster than a horse.



But how much time do you have to get there?

1770: Cugnot Fardier
1915-1918: WW1. Allies developed motorized tracked vehicles, the earliest proposal was to mount a light artillery on a holt tractor. this is french concept but it evolved into earliest tanks. too bad the tank assumes the role of cavs instead of artillery
1920s.: British Mechanized Warfare journal publised. Forerunner of german Blitzkrieg.
1936: Spanish Civil War, Soviets and Germany joined the fray, supporting the opposing sites that followed their political thinking. Germany deployed Condor Legion to test the effects of mechanized 'Blitzkrieg' warfare
1939: WW2 broke out! Germany annexed Poland using the newly learned Blitzkrieg
1940: France campaign. Germany invaded France and low countries using blitzkrieg, the relatively bigger size of france and Maginot evasion manuever resulted in a lenghtened supply line and the need of self-propelled artillery for the firesupport and antitank roles. it is said that the SIG1, self propelled 75mm (or 125mm) was first deployed. since the difficulties in france. Germany designed a series of mobile artillery throughout the course of the war.
1941: Russia campaign. Germany invaded Eastern Europe, confided that Soviet will fall before the winter. the Battle of Stalingrad, however, was a disaster... USSR deployed Katyusha and self propelled cannons extensively
1942: U.S.A. joined the Fray, on the Allied side, M3 and M4 medium tanks (which the U.S. 'lend leased' brits about 2 years earlier) saw first deployment by americans.
1943-1944: M3 (both Lee and Grant) became obsolette, the Allied converted them into self-propelled howitzer. the M7 'Priest'. while Brits made the first mobile artillery much earlier by converted either Bren gun carrier into mobile Antitank gun platform (the gun itself is of 37mm family, weak and outdated anyway) or Valentines into either Archer or Bishop. the Americans however, fielded the first self propelled howitzer for the first time.

it takes about 170 years that the mobile artillery concepts became common. well i'm only wrote the date/years that self propelled artillery concept saw significant development. the artillery hitched by tractors or rail-carriage cannons are excluded.

Lone Cat wrote:1770: Cugnot Fardier... ...1915-1918...

A long time then. I was tempted to post a picture of a Wespe over the M109. But the M109 is a good enough example of an SPG in current use.

BTW: Detroit appears to have been a British domain in 1769.

Didn't Gustavus Adolphus have units of 'flying artillery' that was basically light horsedrawn cannon?

Given that the turks had a raging 12-foot hardon for any sort of cannon or fire-arm, it would make sense to investigate the turks. I would wager that animal-driven weapons would have come from the Turks first and foremost, given their long and prodigious history with artillery.

any military tool requires a number of things in order to function to maximum military ability. Firstly, it needs to be robust. The fewer working parts there are to it, the less there is to go wrong with it, and the harder the trooper in question must try when earning the ire of his commanding officer in the attempt to break the piece of equipment. Second is mobility. A self propelled unit might be ideal, but the trouble becomes apparent when looking at the cugnot. The cugnot goes both directions, sure, but incredibly slowly, it's too slow to turn, and really is massive. The material that went into that could probably have been used on upwards of 2-3 artillery pieces looking at the wood and guessing on the labor which causes A further defect of it's size is the ability to deploy it in terrain. You'd need to cut a swathe of trees down to move it freely, and it's ponderously slow speed means it would have trouble in the field, and its mass would be unfavorable to pull manually when it's own power got it stuck somewhere. Another concern is horsepower. Just what is the maximum load this engine can carry and still be considered "mobile"? As it is, this thing doesn't appear to be carrying a heck of a lot, and I'd not consider this mobile in the field. I know that you can get a lot out of steam power, but what you get out of it is also dependent on the system its built on. Hence why steam power was adopted by the railway, and boat, and why it was horse for everything else in between.

now, there is also the problem of simplicity. The Cugnot is by no means simple when compared to a horse-drawn artillery piece. The cugnot requires special maintenance and a supply of water and coal/wood to keep it going, and careful tending by an engineer. It requires a lot of upkeep, and that kind of upkeep is costly. It goes hand in hand with my earlier point that the less you have to train someone, the quicker you can field the unit.

Most importantly though, well..... not everyone might agree with me on this, especially when field performance comes into question.... is the financial cost. There is a reason that there are a finite number of, say, chinooks, jets and AC-130s in the american military, and also why the canadian military has not replaced the Seaking (read: sea-cling), helicopters, and that is simply, it is expensive. As i mentioned the cost of maintenance makes it highly unattractive but when you compare the cost of commissioning a cugnot against commissioning 2-3 artillery pieces, 2-3 win out against 1.

Vulcan wrote:Didn't Gustavus Adolphus have units of 'flying artillery' that was basically light horsedrawn cannon?

Yeah. Adolphus is the guy who deployed large numbers of light artillery for the first time, favouring it over heavier cannon for the ability to advance it up the field to support other units, and rapidly redeploy.

Those two ideas - support other units, and rapid redeployment, are basically how Adolphus changed warfare. Instead of the massive, unwieldy infantry blocks that were considered enough brute force to overwhelm anything else (Spanish Tercios could be 50 deep, and 3,000 strong, operating in close support to 2 other Tercios, for a block of almost 10,000 man - so redeployment to a new threat was basically impossible), Adolphus preferred smaller units capable of rapid redeployment, operating in close co-ordination with artillery and cavalry.

Smaller cannon able to be quickly limbered and redeployed to another part of the battlefield was a cornerstone of that concept. Napoleon considered him one of the greatest generals of all time, and largely copied his concepts in building his army.

So Gustav predates Napoleon and the American Civil War. Now... do we have anything that predates Gustav for mobile artillery?

Do Hussite wagons count? 1400's?

George Spiggott wrote:

Lone Cat wrote:3.4 Why no one else in Europe developed the similar vehicles out of Cugnot thing? not even Napoleon has any interest in this machine, did he? can't it be developed to be faster than horse?

It is in every way inferior to a horse drawn artillery. Yes it can be developed to be faster than a horse.

But how much time do you have to get there?

apparently not much.

besides, "mobile" is a relative term.



yea yea being former AF I am biased anyway. but sue me! can't argue with its results!

Now, about the mechanization of horse drawn artillery.
1. What does the steam artillery tractor in Crimean war looks like? if the brits really used any in the Crimean theatre?
2. How well did it performs in the field test?
3. is the USA the first nation on earth to use 'railway artillery'? What was the first battle involving the use of such thing.


here. a yanks siege mortar hitched by train!

Amaya wrote:Scariest video I have ever seen was of American artillery (I think it was USMC) unloading on some poor city in Iraq at night from like 10 miles out. My god, those weapons are powerful.

I always thought Nebelwerfers are very scary too.

Lone Cat wrote:
1940: France campaign. Germany invaded France and low countries using blitzkrieg, the relatively bigger size of france and Maginot evasion manuever resulted in a lenghtened supply line and the need of self-propelled artillery for the firesupport and antitank roles. it is said that the SIG1, self propelled 75mm (or 125mm) was first deployed. since the difficulties in france. Germany designed a series of mobile artillery throughout the course of the war.
1941: Russia campaign. Germany invaded Eastern Europe, confided that Soviet will fall before the winter. the Battle of Stalingrad, however, was a disaster... USSR deployed Katyusha and self propelled cannons extensively
1942: U.S.A. joined the Fray, on the Allied side, M3 and M4 medium tanks (which the U.S. 'lend leased' brits about 2 years earlier) saw first deployment by americans.
1943-1944: M3 (both Lee and Grant) became obsolette, the Allied converted them into self-propelled howitzer. the M7 'Priest'. while Brits made the first mobile artillery much earlier by converted either Bren gun carrier into mobile Antitank gun platform (the gun itself is of 37mm family, weak and outdated anyway) or Valentines into either Archer or Bishop. the Americans however, fielded the first self propelled howitzer for the first time.

A lot of this is wrong. The Germans originally designed the StuG specifically to provide direct fire support while also having the capability to provide indirect fire, I think that they were the only nation to take the concept seriously before the war. As the war progressed the StuG became solely used in a direct fire role. The various sIGs was armed with a 150mm infantry gun by the way and they were essentially introduced as these guns were found to be too cumbersome for mechanised formations. The Germans also produced the Wespe (with a 105mm gun) and the Hummel (with a 150mm gun) as dedicated SP artillery.

The Soviets didn't think much of SP artillery until they encountered the StuG and then they went over board in the typical Soviet fashion manufacturing huge numbers of SP artillery (which was usually used in direct fire) which then morphed into heavy antitank/breakthrough guns by the end of the war.

The first British SP gun was the Bishop, a 25 pounder mounted on a Valentine chassis, which was introduced in 1942 and then replaced by the Sexton (a 25 pounder on a a Ram chassis) . The American M7 Priest was also used.

The carrier with the 2 pounder was never used in combat and the Archer was a dedicated anti tank vehicle armed with a 17 pounder.

The Americans used a number of vehicles ranging from the M8 HMC which was essentially a light tank with a 75mm howitzer to the M12 GMC with a 155mm gun.

Just found it and thought it would fit here: