Archers v. artillery

[Erpingham]

Slightly heretical thought but what happened to artillery in the sixteenth century?  I have a vague recollection that gunners under fire/attack would abandon guns and hide behind the nearest foot.  The battle then flowed over the gun and the winning side recovered it at the end of the battle.  So, abstracting, guns can become "casualties" which may mean the crew has died round the gun but could equally be they had decided, as technical specialists, they should should make a tactical withdrawal until the technology was required again.

[Duncan Head]

Based entirely on Wikipedia I gather the Ming used artillery extensively in 1413/14 against the Mongols who were of course primarily archers, though mounted. I know Chinese sources don't "do" narrative like western sources but do we have any details of the interaction?

Not sure about this specific campaign, but in general the Ming, like the Europeans, favoured putting their artillery behind fortifications.

Generally speaking, the Ming emphasized cannon over hand-held guns, though both were understood to be much more effective against steppe cavalry when deployed behind fixed fortifications.

- or in wagon  forts as in http://greatmingmilitary.blogspot.com/2017/02/qi-ji-guangs-che-ying-p1.html

[aligern]

A quick search on Turks shows them using an artillery fortification at Chaldiran 1507 likely  with the Janissaries with the guns. At Varna the Jannissaries are behind fortifications and I wonder if there are some  guns there too.
' The Ottomans deployed heavy artillery and thousands of Janissaries equipped with gunpowder weapons behind a barrier of carts. The Safavids, who did not have artillery at their disposal at Chaldiran,[25] used cavalry to engage the Ottoman forces. The Safavids attacked the Ottoman wings in an effort to avoid the Ottoman artillery positioned at the center. However, the Ottoman artillery was highly maneuverable and the Safavids suffered disastrous losses.[26] The advanced Ottoman weaponry was the deciding factor of the battle as the Safavid forces, who only had traditional weaponry, were decimated. The Safavids also suffered from poor planning and ill-disciplined troops unlike the Ottomans.[27]bWikipedia. I don't buy the manoeuvreability of the guns, but they may have been placed to fire to the flank as that would be where the Persian cavalry were expected to be.

It is nteresting that the gun fort or gun camp or gun besring wagen burg occurs across the Balkans to Europe, to the Turks, the Mughals even the Chinese. Is it a matter of an idea being transmitted or does it originate separately in an age where guns and handgubs are becoming  widespread and very threatening to a mounted elite , but cavalry are everywhere dominant.  The interaction of guns and opposing bows is probably not the prime reason, rather each army deploying a frtified gun line was looking to defend its artillery against whatever was the prime agent in its enemy's attack, so longbowmen, Swiis pikes, charging knights, Persians or Mamelukes, ir even elehants. However they attacked it was necessary to rotect guns and handguns from them.

[Patrick Waterson]

It is interesting that the gun fort or gun camp or gun bearing wagenburg occurs across the Balkans to Europe, to the Turks, the Mughals even the Chinese. Is it a matter of an idea being transmitted or does it originate separately in an age where guns and handguns are becoming  widespread and very threatening to a mounted elite , but cavalry are everywhere dominant.  The interaction of guns and opposing bows is probably not the prime reason, rather each army deploying a fortified gun line was looking to defend its artillery against whatever was the prime agent in its enemy's attack, so longbowmen, Swiss pikes, charging knights, Persians or Mamelukes, or even elephants. However they attacked it was necessary to protect guns and handguns from them.

That makes very good sense, at least to me.

Within the limited context of this thread, it looks as if the question of the effectiveness of longbowmen (or other missile troops) vs artillery is turning into a question of getting the artillery to pay a few extra points for field fortifications.  (If through perversity they do not, they have the options of running away when missile troops come within range or dying in place.)

[Mark G]

That seems a reasonable summation for western Europe at least.

I do wonder whether more effort could go into placing guns relative to bows and attack lines though.

What I hypothesise is that guns are not placed in line of a main attack by the attacker, and are not often seen lined up against archery by the defenders (excluding battles around camps of fortifications).

From which I would conclude that guns are not powerful enough to prepare the main attack, as HnM guns are, and are not dangerous enough to warrant concentrated archery by the defender.

My pre supposition us that in general, they are a frippery to the field battle.  Nice to have, presenting something additional to the army, but not at all central to the plan until you reach an opponent which is fixed in place and not going anywhere.

And then I would go to the table effect.  If guns are doing enough damage to necessitate a major bow unit to get after them, then they may be over powered, and that needs addressing.

We all seem to agree that gunners are pretty helpless against arrows.  But consider how many gunners are there to be got at.  How many archers ate you committing to clear them out?

More than 1-2-1 seems total overkill unless your archers are hopeless shots, or the bows take half an hour to reload.

That is my idea, anyway.

If it offers anything to the question.

[Duncan Head]

My pre supposition us that in general, they are a frippery to the field battle.  Nice to have, presenting something additional to the army, but not at all central to the plan until you reach an opponent which is fixed in place and not going anywhere.

My suspicion is that this depends exactly what period you are talking about; it may be true in the 14th century, but I'm not sure it is by the later 15th.

[aligern]

Guns and handguns/ early arquebus are slow to fire, but ( let us assume) quite damaging when they do. Where they are not defending the camp, or where the camp is placed so as to form part of the battle line then they are being empkaced with a purpose. in Eastern battles the centrally placed and firtified shooters are there to act as a force multiplier. The Lodi troops oppising Babur are expecting their cavalry and elephants  which have a large advantage in numbers to roll over him, but the fort to their fron baljs them and they suffer severely in front of it (Shades of Kagemusha here) .  Similarly at Chaldiran the Persians have the better cavalry. Here the artillery camps are used like earlier steppe waggon forts, they channel the oppising cavalry who will find that they are exposing their flanks both to fire from the fort and cavalry placed  behind it.  The Hussites, ne presumes, are using the fort / wagonburg concept because they doubt that they could hold off the Crusaders in the open.
The question they all seek to answer is how to get value from gunpowder weapons which are deadly but slow and lack defensive capability.  The weakness of providing the cannon and handguns with field fortifications is that these can be avoided, or assaulted by good infantry. The key innvation that occurred in the awest was to combine pike and shot  and produce a moving fort that could attack as well as defend and where the shot degraded the enemy before the white weapons did their work. The English had managed a similar combination in the 14th century , but had only in a defensive stance and it would take until the later 17th century to get it to work well enough , but then it went on to dominate the world. 
I suggest that the gunpowder weapons should be slow to fire, but deadly when they do to anyone stuck in front of them and that they should be able to shoot out laterally at a flat angle so that they cannot just be bypassed, which opponents of the period seem not to have been able to do?
R

[Mick Hession]

My pre supposition us that in general, they are a frippery to the field battle.  Nice to have, presenting something additional to the army, but not at all central to the plan until you reach an opponent which is fixed in place and not going anywhere.

My suspicion is that this depends exactly what period you are talking about; it may be true in the 14th century, but I'm not sure it is by the later 15th.

Agreed. At Formigny the fire of just two culverins was galling enough for the English to risk abandoning their defensive position to capture them and try to carry them off. That suggests guns were effective by then at least.

Cheers
Mick

[Jim Webster]

My pre supposition us that in general, they are a frippery to the field battle.  Nice to have, presenting something additional to the army, but not at all central to the plan until you reach an opponent which is fixed in place and not going anywhere.

My suspicion is that this depends exactly what period you are talking about; it may be true in the 14th century, but I'm not sure it is by the later 15th.

Agreed. At Formigny the fire of just two culverins was galling enough for the English to risk abandoning their defensive position to capture them and try to carry them off. That suggests guns were effective by then at least.

Cheers
Mick

I think that by a certain period (not entirely sure the cut of date) I don't think you could just stand in range of artillery and ignore it for long.
But it's interesting that they tried to carry off the guns, not merely shoot down the gunners with archery.
I'd suggest that in 'field conditions' it wasn't something worth attempting.
We've not found anybody who claimed to have done it or even attempted it

[Erpingham]

At Formigny the fire of just two culverins was galling enough for the English to risk abandoning their defensive position to capture them and try to carry them off. That suggests guns were effective by then at least.

At least annoying.  I assume they were set up beyond the shooting range of archers and were effectively shooting at a large immobile target.  Each shot may have killed several men (we have sixteenth century records of this effect)  but, given the low rate of fire, how lethal this was in the big scheme of things?  But it isn't the only battle in which troops wouldn't remain static under fire they couldn't answer.

[Erpingham]

But it's interesting that they tried to carry off the guns, not merely shoot down the gunners with archery.

This may be confirmation of earlier speculation that gunners legged it rather than fight for the guns.  The only way the English could prevent the French remanning them was to drag them off.  Or, then again, it could be trophy hunting

[Andreas Johansson]

This may be confirmation of earlier speculation that gunners legged it rather than fight for the guns.  The only way the English could prevent the French remanning them was to drag them off.  Or, then again, it could be trophy hunting

When do we first hear of guns being spiked to render recapture irrelevant?

[Erpingham]

This may be confirmation of earlier speculation that gunners legged it rather than fight for the guns.  The only way the English could prevent the French remanning them was to drag them off.  Or, then again, it could be trophy hunting

When do we first hear of guns being spiked to render recapture irrelevant?

According to OED, term first used in 1617

1617   F. Moryson Itinerary ii. 166   Some were found having spikes and hammers to cloy the cannon.

Use in other places or if there was an earlier name for the practice, don't know.

[Patrick Waterson]

My pre supposition us that in general, they are a frippery to the field battle.  Nice to have, presenting something additional to the army, but not at all central to the plan until you reach an opponent which is fixed in place and not going anywhere.

My suspicion is that this depends exactly what period you are talking about; it may be true in the 14th century, but I'm not sure it is by the later 15th.

In AD 1494, Charles VIII invaded Italy with the first really effective train of field artillery.  However, between the difficulties of bringing the guns up to where they were needed and Italian rainstorms wetting the powder, it was not until AD 1512 that artillery began to be really effective on the battlefield.  At Ravenna that same year, both sides fielded dozens of artillery pieces and the French were able to move some of theirs during the battle to enfilade the Spanish encampment.  In essence, the French artillery hit the Spanish cavalry and the Spanish artillery hit the French infantry; the Spanish then lost the cavalry fight and the French the infantry fight, but the commitment of the victorious French cavalry enabled the hitherto unsuccessful French infantry to prevail over their Spanish counterparts.  It is noteworthy that the Spanish cavalry did not attempt to charge the 24 French guns which had moved to enfilade them, but instead went for their traditional opponents, the French cavalry.

The following year, (1513), the French fell out with the Swiss, and in the resultant battle of Novara the Swiss, making a dawn surprise attack, took an estimated 2,000 casualties (out of 12,000 attackers) from the French artillery, but still pressed their attack home, broke the landsknechts in French service and captured the French guns.

[Andreas Johansson]

When do we first hear of guns being spiked to render recapture irrelevant?

According to OED, term first used in 1617

1617   F. Moryson Itinerary ii. 166   Some were found having spikes and hammers to cloy the cannon.

Use in other places or if there was an earlier name for the practice, don't know.

Thanks. While there might have earlier names for it, I think we can reasonably assume that England wasn't too far behind anywhere else in matters of gunpowder warfare.