Gribeauval's new artillery was at the technological forefront until r825,
but the Revolution provided a new fillip after Valmy in 1792, which was
far in advance of any battle yet fought in terms of big guns and artillery
rounds fired. The war fever of 1793 saw massive production of artillery
weapons - seven thousand cannon in that year alone - and the efforts of
scientists like Gaspard Monge made sure that France remained at the
technological cutting edge. The know-how was therefore in place, ready
to be exploited by an artilleryman of high talent. No more perfect
individual for this particular historical moment could be imagined than
the young Bonaparte, schooled as he was in the doctrines of du Teil and
Guibert.
Yet if France had the edge in big guns, its superiority in infantry
firepower was marginal. Battlefield firearms were still mainly muzzle
loading, smooth-bore flintlocks, and the standard issue was the 1777
Charleville musket (in use until r84o) - a .70 calibre weapon, fifty inches
long (without bayonet). This was virtually useless against compact bodies
of troops at ranges greater than 250 yards, and even a sharpshooter
needed one hundred yards range or less to pick out an individual. The
crudity of this weapon was the reason battlefields were often blacked out
with dense clouds of smoke. Every soldier carried into battle fifty
cartridges, powder charges and three spare flints, but the coarse black
powder used by the French resulted in excessive fouling of the barrels, so
that they had to be cleaned after every fifty rounds; the flint also needed
to be changed after a dozen shots. Muskets misfired on average once in
six shots, which in the heat of battle often led to soldiers double-loading
their weapons.
The crudity of gunfire in this period needs emphasis. Reloading was a
clumsy, complicated, time-consuming business. Typically an infantryman
would take a paper cartridge from his pouch and bite off the end
containing the ball, which he retained in his mouth; then he opened the
'pan' of his musket, poured in a priming charge and closed it; next he
tipped the remainder of the powder down the barrel, spat the musket ball
after it, folded the paper into a wad and then forced both ball and wad
down the barrel on to the powder charge with his ramrod; finally he took
aim and fired. The mere recital shows how many things could go wrong:
a soldier could double-load after an unnoticed misfire, or forget to
withdraw his ramrod before pulling the trigger; most commonly, clumsy
or malingering soldiers would spill most of the powder charge on the
ground to avoid the mule-kick of the weapons at their shoulder.
When to the crudity of the musket is added generally poor
marksmanship by the French, it can be readily understood why Napoleon
marcin
(Marcin)
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