Official Newsletter of the Michigan Company of Military Historians
& Collectors
SEPTEMBER 2011
"The secret of all victory lies in the organization of the non-obvious."
- Marcus Aurelius
September Speaker
Gentlemen, our September speaker will be Ceo E. Bauer, WWII veteran of the 95 Infantry
Division. Ceo and his comrades fought through almost insurmountable German resistance and
earned the title, "Iron Men of Metz." Ceo has also been back to France several times to walk
familiar battlefields, and receive the overwhelming appreciation of a grateful nation. —J. Porter
MEETINGS take place the second Monday of every month at the Radisson Hotel Grand Rapids
Riverfront 270 Ann St NW, Grand Rapids, MI 49504 (616) 363-9001. Socializing begins at 6:00 (1800),
dinner at 7:00 (1900), business meeting 7:15 (1915), and program at 8:00 (2000).
GENERAL STAFF
OFFICERS OF THE COMPANY
Commandant, Deno Sellas
Executive Officer, Jason Porter
Adjutant, James Henningsen
Judge Advocate, Boyd Conrad
Mess Officer, Mike Krushinsky
Sgt.-at-Arms, Richard Foster
Editor, Cannon Report, José A. Amorós
Cannon Report Staff,
Tom Sutter, Guy Greene
Editor Emeritus, Bill Alexander
Open Mess Chairman, Jay Stone
Membership Committee, Kingman Davis
Archivist, Richard O’Beshaw
Website:
http://www.thecannonreport.org/
Facebook:
Michigan Company of Military Historians and
Collectors
Longbow: A Medieval Take on Long-Range Artillery
By Jon Guttman
The Welsh introduced the weapon (or at least its projectiles) to the English during the 11th
century Anglo-Norman invasion of Wales. The English did the same for the French, above.
(Illustration by Gregory Proch)
The earliest known reference to a "longbow" appears in the 15th century. Until then it had been
known as the Welsh or English bow. The Welsh introduced the weapon (or at least its projectiles)
to the English during the 11th century Anglo-Norman invasion of Wales. The English first used
the weapon to effect at the 1138 Battle of the Standard, when William of Aumale defeated King
David I of Scotland. By the late 13th century King Edward I was having his archers practice
weekly, a discipline that led to such decisive English victories as Crécy (1346), Poitiers (1356)
and Agincourt (1415).
As described by Gerald of Wales, archdeacon of Brecon (c. 1146–1223), the original Welsh bows
were primarily of elm, "ugly, unfinished-looking weapons, but astonishingly stiff, large and
strong, and equally capable of use for long or short shooting." They could also be of ash or yew,
2
with horn nocks on either end to hold strings of hemp, flax or silk. Dried for one to two years and
worked down when wet into a D-shaped cross section—heartwood in the center, sapwood in the
back—these "self-wood" bows boasted a natural laminate property similar to that of modern-day
composite bows. After drying, the bow staves were preserved with wax, resin or fine tallow. A
well-trained bowman could hit targets out to 180 yards, though the bows were effective in volley
well beyond that range.
http://www.historynet.com/longbow-a-medieval-take-on-long-range-artillery.htm/1
Korean War Outbreak: A Study in Unpreparedness
By Dale S. Marmion
The outbreak of the Korean War is a classic example of an army
facing battle totally unprepared. Numerous histories of the
Korean War have been written and many historians have
discussed the outbreak of the Korean War. A point they nearly
all agree upon is that the combined forces south of the
Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) in Korea were unprepared for what
turned out to be a long and extremely grueling war. That is, war,
and most certainly not “police action,” as it has sometimes been
referred to, raised catastrophic havoc with soldiers on the ground
during the initial stages of the action that devastated the Korean
Peninsula and Korean people.
Although this theory is contested by some because of the early
and dramatic success of the US and combined UN forces after
the landing at Inchon, it is generally agreed by experts that we
were unprepared for the Korean hostilities in 1950 as they
unfolded at the outbreak of the war. It has been a common
mantra often coined to justify military budget increases that we were a “Hollow Force ” and
classically unprepared to face the rudimentary, even outmoded, and ill equipped force that we
faced in the North Korean aggressors. This was after we had victoriously emerged from W.W.II
as the undisputed number one power in the world. In a very real sense, after the Japanese
capitulated with an unconditional surrender on the battleship Missouri, the Pacific became
undoubtedly an "American Lake.” Why after such a hard fought but overwhelming victory in
1945, and undisputed power in the Pacific and East Asian theater, were we so unprepared to face
a foreign enemy only 5 years later?
“No More Task Force Smiths” became a common Army adage to recall the initial stages of the
Korean War and its often exampled readiness failings. Like "Remember the Alamo" this often
coined expression refers to the first task force quickly put together in Japan and sent to Korea to
engage the North Korean aggressors. Both forces were totally unprepared, ill equipped, heavily
outnumbered, and thrust into the jaws of combat in order to buy time for additional fighting
forces to build up elsewhere. The North Korean advances made short work of the South Korean
resistance and rapidly moved down the Korean peninsula. The North Korean attack south was so
quick that haste both helped define and influence the makeup of the task force. Hasty planning
and execution is always a force detractor both in and out of war.
3
There is little documented evidence to suggest that any prior planning or suggested strategies of
action anticipated victory in the field. However, General Douglas MacArthur did state that this
deployed force intended to be “an arrogant display of strength,” – arrogant maybe, a successful
display of strength much more problematical. However, from this seemingly cryptic comment can
be perceived a glimmer of an asserted possibility of success, or as General MacArthur suggested,
intimidating to the North Koreans. This glimmer belies a certain lack of substantive operational
knowledge that necessarily underlies any projection of success at all. However, lack of
substantive operational knowledge, supply and logistic health or not, and current readiness be
damned. Ready or not, immediate action ordered by General MacArthur was unavoidable.
After going to Korea and viewing the rapid course of the battle and South Korean Army
withdrawal first hand, for General MacArthur success was defined as buying as much time for
space given, as possible. This meant that however unprepared, units were to be deployed from
Japan immediately in hope that they would delay the advance and buy time for additional units to
deploy before Korea was overrun. In this, the strategy proved successful. However, this strategy
was purchased at a considerable cost in human casualties because of unpreparedness.
It was also believed prior to the outbreak of the war that air power could neutralize any threat to
the Korean Peninsula. The Joint Chiefs of Staff (JCS) even recommended that some or all of the
45,000 ground forces in Korea would be better used elsewhere. The JCS further reported that
“from a strategic viewpoint… Korea is of little strategic value to the United States and that any
commitment to United States use of military force in Korea would be ill-advised and
impracticable in view of the potentialities of the over-all world situation and of our heavy
international obligations as compared with our current military strength.” The State Department
concurred.
First of all, there was no actionable intelligence to prepare the hastily put together task force for
what to expect. This lack of intelligence was at several different levels for different reasons. From
a national policy level Korea was considered of little strategic importance. American policy
makers simply considered Korea less vital than other areas of Asia. The United States was hell
bent on checking the spread of Soviet communism albeit in Europe, not in East Asia. Secretary of
State Dean Acheson effectually stated in a 1950 speech that no commitment existed to include
Korea in the established Pacific defense perimeter that ran from the Aleutian Islands to Japan,
through the Ryukus (Okinawa) to the Philippines. Outside this stated perimeter there was no
military commitment or obligation to support. Considering this stated policy, some experts have
alleged that neither North Korea nor the other major communist states, USSR or China, were
convinced that the U.S. would commit to a full-scale defense of South Korea if invaded.
Lack of intelligence plagued every echelon of decision making and operations throughout the
Korean War. Intelligence was gathered in Korea by several different organizations that did not
share information with each other. The Korean Military Advisory Group (KMAG) gathered
intelligence for the State Department that further sifted and selected intelligence reports for
Washington. The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) was the civilian agency collecting
intelligence in Korea. There were only four agents in Korea however, and with the three agents in
Japan made only seven total, and they were responsible for collecting intelligence throughout the
entire Far East. Their reports were further sifted by the Ambassador’s offices before passing to
Washington. The Korean Liaison Office (KLO) was a covert operation set up to be the eyes and
ears of Far East Command under General MacArthur and reported to his G-2. No one knows why
these organizations did not share information. The intelligence that finally did reach Washington
was of little substantive value and if any of it now can be considered in hindsight as possibly
4
useful to the ensuing conflict, was largely ignored. This was because Korea was not considered
important.
The head of KMAG, Brigadier General William L. Roberts was also responsible for training the
Republic of Korea Army (ROKA). His praise of ROKA’s capabilities was magnanimous. He
reportedly did not think that the North Korea could successfully invade South Korea. For Time
magazine he stated prior to the outbreak of hostilities that the ROK army is the “best doggone
shooting Army outside the United States."
This same BG Roberts, in charge of training the ROK Army, was supposedly an armor expert,
and when discussing the Korean terrain and armor in the same breath, he inexplicably assessed
the Korean terrain as inimical to armored warfare and thus dismissed the North Korean People’s
Army (NKPA) armor. There was thus no provision for enhanced ROKA training to prepare for
the contingency of ROKA armor. He never mentioned the threat of North Korean (Soviet) armor
or the ability to defend against it in this hilly, mountainous country. This was an expert
assessment.
Orders given to LTC Smith by the division commander, MG William F. Dean were also lacking
in actionable intelligence and substantive operational planning.
“When you get to Pusan, head for Taejon. We want to stop the North Koreans as far from Pusan
as we can. Block the main road as far north as possible. Make contact with General Church. If
you can’t find him, go to Taejon and beyond if you can. Sorry I can’t give you more
information—that’s all I’ve got. Good luck, and God bless you and your men!”
What transpired during the initial engagement of the war was anything but an arrogant,
intimidating display of American strength. First, there was no actionable intelligence to prepare
the hastily put together task force for what to expect. Second, the briefed objectives were unclear.
So unclear, that the men sent to do the fighting didn't have a second notion just what they would
be facing or why. Thrown into the breach in order to buy time for space, into the fray went Task
Force Smith unprepared.
Task Force Smith (TFS) was made up of elements of the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment
consisting of 2 under strength rifle companies, B and C; one-half a Headquarters Company; onehalf a communications platoon; a 75-mm recoilless rifle platoon of four guns and four 4.2-inch
mortars, about 406 men. Both companies combined had six 2.36-inch bazooka teams and four 60mm mortars. Soldiers were equipped with 120 rounds of ammunition and two days of rations.
They were supported by a battery of the 52d Field Artillery commanded by LTC Miller O. Perry
of 134 men. This force as thrown together and rapidly deployed is aptly named for LTC Charles
B. Smith who was chosen by Major General Dean, the 24th Infantry Division Commander, for his
experience as a wartime leader in W.W. II, notably at Guadalcanal as a Battalion Commander.
In what would later be known as the Battle of Osan, began for TFS at 0700, July 5, 1950. The
men of TFS were positioned to first meet columns of Soviet built T-34 tanks who were in pursuit
of the retreating ROKA. As the first column of tanks moved in range the men of TFS hit them
with recoilless rifles, bazookas, mortars, and conventional non-armor-piercing artillery rounds,
the result being no significant damage whatsoever. Some of the bazooka rounds did not explode
because they were so old and could not penetrate the armor. Then the forward deployed howitzer
fired all of its HEAT rounds damaging 2 tanks but was finally overwhelmed by fire from the 3rd
tank. When issued this limited amount of effective ammunition no preparation had considered for
the possibility of a tank assault.
5
After all, BG Roberts, who was in charge of training, didn't consider Korea tank country, and
ammunition of all kinds in theater was old, ineffective, and in short supply. The men were not
adept at their warrior tasks and remained confused and uninformed, or ignorant. And as G.I.s will
often complain, they were treated like mushrooms, kept in the dark and fed full of…
misinformation. By their own admission, members of TFS such as Bill Wyrick, Platoon Leader,
2d Platoon, C Company effectually stated at a memorial to the Battle of Osan and TFS in Korea
on July 5, 1998, that the vanguard of UN and US Forces thought they were there to aid with a
withdrawal. Philip Day, another Platoon Leader of TFS said "that he didn't know what to expect
when he found out that he was being deployed to Korea. Like many other soldiers, he thought
that they went to Korea to help evacuate US citizens."
The battle raged on for several hours. The NKPA columns kept moving up behind the tank
advance and about 1100 hours two regiments, the 16th and 18th of the 4th NK Infantry Division
began maneuvering into offensive posture and deploying deadly force of arms engaged the men
of TFS. It must be said that this unprepared, poorly trained, more poorly equipped force
ultimately put up a courageous stand against the approximately 5,000 NKPA soldiers. They did
their job. Amazingly they were able to hold out for about 3 hours. At approximately 1430 LTC
Smith finally ordered the withdrawal. At this time TFS was suffering from communication
breakdown, ammunition depletion, and were rapidly being outflanked. The ordered and tactically
planned withdrawal that allowed for covering force gradually became a hasty retreat with
equipment, dead, and some 25 seriously injured left behind. This hasty retreat further broke down
into a confused and disorganized rout. One North Korean officer later told historian John Toland
that the American forces at the battle seemed "too frightened to fight."
By nightfall 250 of TFS's men had straggled back to the American lines with about 150 more
killed, wounded or missing. They continued to straggle in over the next several days. As late as 5
days later, men from the 2d Platoon, B company reached Chonan 30 minutes before the NKPA
regulars. During the breakout offensive of the Pusan perimeter, US troops moving north
discovered shallow graves that contained bodies of men belonging to the 24th Infantry Division.
All of them showed positive signs of being shot in the back of the head, their hands bound by
communications wire. The implications of such a travesty are clear, and make the initial, poorly
planned, "arrogant display of American strength," shockingly costly, and at the time dangerously
close to a routed defeat, if it were not for, the eventually remarkable good fortune, resiliency, and
persistent tenacity of those same American and later combined United Nations forces.
Cries for rapid and wholesale demobilization after World War II rang paramount without any
significant opposition. It didn't matter that not only seasoned warriors but experienced technicians
were furloughed out of the services in droves. After all, they won the big war and deserved to go
home. The logical result was that there were very few seasoned warriors with TFS. General
George C. Marshall described it thusly. "For the moment, in a widespread emotional crisis of the
American People; demobilization has become, in effect, disintegration, not only of the armed
forces but of all conception of world responsibility and what it demands of us."
Reconversion of America's vast war production machine and the retooling of its factories to
peacetime moneymaking products was quick and without concern for the remote possibility of
any future conflict. "The rush to dispose of vast stocks of military equipment and supplies and
rapid conversion of its productive capacity, and the failure to retain the capability to quickly
remobilize this capacity sowed the seeds of the nations' unpreparedness for its next war."
Secretary of Defense Forrestal's report to the President and Congress in 1948 brought this
controversy clearly home to US leadership. "We have scrapped our war machine, mightiest in the
6
history of the world, in a manifestation of confidence that we should not need it any longer. Our
quick and complete demobilization was a testimony to our good will rather than to our common
sense."
Although the average soldier that fought in the Korean War wore regular army serial numbers as
had all other soldiers in the past and present they were an entirely new breed of soldier. They
were products of a post war drawdown and social philosophy that bred unpreparedness. They
were probably as contented a bunch of fat and happy G.I.s as had even existed up to this point in
American history. Was it their fault that they had forgotten that the basic function of an army is to
fight and if need be to die on the battlefield? Their basic philosophy was that gooks can't fight
and that when this police action was over they would soon be back to their comfortable life in
Japan where a lieutenant made as much as a high Japanese cabinet official, all G.I.s had their own
shoeshine boy or mamasan and hard, realistic training was nonexistent.
Disorganized retreat or rather flight was the norm at the early stages of the Korean War. "Men
threw away their shoes, because it was difficult to walk in the mud. They had no canteens, and
they had no food. They were tired and dispirited, and some were bitter. Some of them grew dizzy
and sick in the hot Korean sun." They told bitter jokes like: "If this is a police action and I'm a
policemen then where the hell's my badge?" and "Damn these crooks over here got big guns!"
None of them had been told why they were in Korea, or why the U.S. was fighting North Korean
Communists. None of them cared. They only wanted to get back to Japan." "They represented
exactly the kind of pampered, undisciplined, egalitarian army their society had long desired and at
last achieved. They had been raised to believe the world was without tigers, then sent to face
those tigers with a stick. On their society must fall the blame."
Retreating in the face of the enemy was the order of the day. In the first few days of fighting in
July alone saw more officer casualties proportionately than any since the Civil War.[24] We were
trained in the tactical doctrine of the European Theater of Operations (ETO) which did not apply
to the enemy tactics and terrain of Korea. The enemy would crash into our neatly displaced units
sacrificing on abundance of manpower, pinning us down, infiltrate our rear then cut us off and cut
us to pieces during the inevitable retreat. At this point all too many were either captured or just
massacred. This happened over and over again. There was a total lack of team effort among the
25th Infantry Division (ID), 7th ID, 24th ID, and 1st Cavalry Division. Again and again the same
old theme held true, there were too few veterans, the Soldiers were not properly equipped and
poorly trained just 5 short years after achieving the greatest victory in the history of the world.
"The abiding weakness of free peoples is that their governments cannot or will not make them
prepare or sacrifice before they are aroused."
Hard, realistic training was, and is very often unpopular because it sometimes results in injuries
and triggers full blown investigations of possible safety protocol violations. Everyone admits that
hard realistic training results in less dead on the battlefield, but a Soldier killed during training
causes Congress to come down hard on officers, because safety protocols must have been
violated for it to have occurred. In these unpopular circumstances senior leaders show no
inclination to back up their junior leaders who implement the hard, realistic training. Many brave
Generals who wouldn't have thought about exposing themselves to enemy fire think twice about
any course of action whatsoever when faced with a congressional inquiry.
In almost all instances new recruits rifles were not zeroed, their mortars untestfired and new
machine guns still oozed cosmoline. When ambushed, leaving their trucks to move up into the
steep Korean hills they dropped like flies. This clearly depicted lack of training. Their legs
unused to hard pulls, gave out. More men dropped of heat exhaustion than NKPA bullets.
7
Lacking water and discipline they drank from rice paddies and contracted dysentery further
aggravating troop morale.
As noticed in TFS' first encounter with the NKPA ground weapons and proper ammunition had
been developed but not procured and issued for use. The Army was told to make due. Make due
and "in an arrogant display of strength" intimidate a determined foe to back down, turn tail and
run. Vehicles didn't run, radiators clogged, engines gone, tires and tubes had a few miles left in
them and came apart on the Korean roads, In Japan most small arms were unserviceable, rifle
barrels worn smooth, mortar mounts were broken and there were no spare barrels for machine
guns. Radios were short and did not work.
During the war the logistical tail continued to wag the dog. We continued to put more men on the
ground to the tune of tens of thousands. It is well documented that while we had at least 10,000
men in three different Corps headquarters, rifle companies that did 90% of the hard fighting,
where the metal meets the meat, were all too often at 25% strength.
The Doolittle Board of 1945-46 met and listened to numerous complaints about the services
abuses resulting from prevailing officer-enlisted man relationships. In an Army that grew so
much during 1941-45 abuses of leadership were easily uncovered and too numerous to mention.
To counter this, the board made some drastic, sometimes questionable recommendations that
were implemented wholesale like the rapid troop demobilization and drawdown. Due to the board
recommendations the caste system of the Army was modified. Captains ceased to be gods, and
sergeants, the backbone of the Army, were told to be one of the boys. Junior officers had their
power to discipline taken from them and couldn't inflict punishment short of a formal court
martial or easily reduce ineffective NCOs. A sergeant, by shouting something at some sensitive
yardbird, could now get his officers into a whole heap of unwanted trouble. Sergeants that figured
out the score started fraternizing with the men. Sergeants began to lead by popularity and not
example or stern authority. Unpreparedness and logistic deficiency festered in the post WWII
Army.
"The infantry battlefield cannot be remade to the order of prevailing mid-century opinion of
American sociologists." If this were true, it would be necessary for Generals and Admirals to
have advanced degrees in Sociology. The problem is not that Americans are soft, complacent, or
most likely to take the path of least resistance, but that they will not individually or as a people
face the fact that military professionals, while some have ideas about society that are distrusted
and must be watched in accordance with the parameters wisely laid down by our founding
fathers, still know better than anyone else how war is won. The sociologists and psychologists of
Vienna had no answer to the Nazi bayonets, when they crashed their doors. Mentally disarmed
and afraid, wholesale capitulation was the only course of action left to the educated engineers of
society faced with the reality of cold hard steel. However, the soldiers of democracies in WW II
most certainly had an answer. History bears this out. Ever prepared, manned, properly equipped,
and trained is the order of the day for the soldier. Not to do so is to repeat tragedy in history as
exampled during the early stages of the Korean War.
Mr. Marmion is currently an Inspector General for 19th Expeditionary Sustainment Command in Korea. He
has served as an Inspector General for U.S. Army Japan, and was Chief of Current Operations for U.S.
Army Japan. He has a B.A. in International Studies from Monterey Institute of International Studies, a
M.A. in Comparative Philosophy from University of Hawaii (UH) at Manoa, and completed work (not
finished) on a Ph.D. in Chinese Philosophy at UH. While heading an inspection of training in Japan and
Okinawa Mr. Marmion took the mantra "no more Task Force Smith's" seriously and was able to influence
implemention changes to training making it more realistic today.
8
Narrative: the Crusade
By Robert M. Citino | Front & Center | Published: July 15, 2011
Last week I urged you all to challenge the "accepted narrative" of World War II, to come up with
things you used to believe about the war that no longer hold water.
I received some great answers! Some of you used to think the western Allies won the war
all by themselves and tended to downplay the massive contributions of the Soviet Union. Others
used to believe that strategic bombing was a fairly low-cost and easy way of bringing Germany to
its knees. Still others now question the notion that the veterans who returned after 1945 slid back
into their civilian lives smoothly and easily and had little trouble readjusting. And some of you
used to think that most Frenchmen fought in the Resistance.
Oh, well.
Today, informed students of the war would question each and every one of these onceaccepted "truths." The point is not to laugh at how naïve we once were, or to enjoy a cheap laugh
at the expense of the French, but merely to point out that the "narrative" about a given event has a
way of hardening early on, and can be very difficult to break.
It is easy to see how it happens. With regards to the "Missing Soviet" narrative, for
example, the 1950s saw the Cold War and U.S. anti-communism in full flower, and few people
were in much of a mood to credit Stalin with helping to defeat Hitler, or to recall the inconvenient truth that just a few short years ago Washington and Moscow had been on the same
side.
Since you were all so forthcoming with your confessions, let me give one of my own,
another part of the traditional narrative that I once swallowed whole, but no longer believe. It is
the notion of World War II as "the great crusade." General Eisenhower enshrined the idea in the
title to his memoirs (Crusade in Europe), and by and large it's still the way we perceive the war.
Calling it a "crusade" sets a high bar. A crusade is, after all, a consecrated undertaking. The
warrior embarks on the adventure not for power or personal aggrandizement, but rather because it
is God's will. He willingly risks life and limb for a higher cause; indeed, he follows Christ on the
"way of the cross," the literal meaning of the term.
Certainly, no sane person will deny that beating Hitler was the classic definition of A
Good Thing. But if U.S. participation in the war was a "crusade" against evil, we certainly took
our time getting involved. World War II lasted for seven campaigning seasons from 1939 to
1945, inclusive, and American forces missed the first three. Indeed, Germany's best chance at
victory had probably come and gone before U.S. troops even joined the fighting. When we finally
got into World War II, it wasn't by choice, which would seem to be one prerequisite for a
"crusade," but because we got bombed (by the Japanese) and had war declared upon us (by the
Germans). And once we did get involved, military necessity impelled us to do a lot of very
unpleasant things: indiscriminate use of firepower, massive aerial bombing of densely populated
urban areas, and—in the most truly horrific expression of war's destructive power—even a couple
of atomic bombs.
I'm not trying to second-guess strategic decisions that were made under pressure a long
time ago or to try our forebears by our supposedly more "enlightened" modern standards. I know
why we dropped the atom bomb; I explain it to my students all the time. It's just that the longer I
study World War II the more I realize how horrible it was, and I'm uncomfortable dignifying
anything that horrible as a "crusade."
http://www.historynet.com/narrative-the-crusade.htm
9
Brown Bess Musket: The Weapon That Won Waterloo
By Jon Guttman | MH Tools | Published: November 04, 2010
Variations of the Brown Bess saw use on both sides of the American Revolution.
(Illustration by Gregory Proch)
Developed in 1722, the British Long Land Pattern musket exemplified a trend among armies of the period
to standardize long arms by specifying a pattern for arms makers to follow. The etymology of its nickname,
"Brown Bess," is uncertain but may be a derivation of the German or Middle Dutch terms for "brown" and
"barrel." (Early gunsmiths coated both the metal and stock of long arms in a protective brown varnish.)
Weighing a little more than 10 pounds, the original Long Land was 62.5 inches long with a 46inch barrel. A lug atop the end of the barrel secured a 17-inch triangular bayonet and doubled as a crude
sight. The British later introduced the Short Land Pattern (shown above), Militia and Marine versions of the
Brown Bess, each fitted with a 42-inch barrel, making for easier handling with no appreciable sacrifice in
accuracy. These remained standard issue for British line infantry units from 1740 to 1797 and also saw use
among American colonists during the French and Indian War. Redcoats faced the muzzles of many a Rebel
Brown Bess during the American Revolution.
In 1790 the British army adopted the India Pattern, featuring a thicker, more accurate 39-inch
barrel, with an effective range of up to 175 yards. In practice, however, Redcoats fired the Brown Bess in
volley at a range of about 50 yards, shattering enemy lines with their high volume of fire. A well-drilled
infantryman could snap off about three shots a minute.
In 1839 the British began converting the flintlock to the more reliable percussion cap mechanism, fielding
them in quantity in the Pattern 1842. That remained in service until the outbreak of the Crimean War, when
the Enfield Model 1853 rifle and Minié ball ended Brown Bess' long reign on the battlefield.
10
http://www.historynet.com/brown-bess-musket-the-weapon-that-won-waterloo.htm/1
The editorial opinions and articles in The Cannon Report do not represent any official position of the Michigan Company of Military
Historians and Collectors (MCMH&C) only the various neuroses of the editor. The MCMH&C is a non-partisan, non-ideological
association. All members are welcome to submit material, letters, “for the good of the company items”, etc.
11