This incident demonstrates exactly the danger of infantry having a flank exposed to a cavalry attack, but that cavalry could be equally vulnerable to formed infantry facing them frontally.
The fight for Blenheim village continued throughout the battle, with the British infantry and their allies unable to capture it. Neither, however, could the French mount a counter-attack to drive off the British and allied infantry.
The attack then increased in vigour and the enemy were driven into the village, where they were too numerous to act, being wedged up into a dense mass so that our well directed fire produced a murderous effect. We retired about 80 or 90 yards and plied them so warmly with our platoons that they were cut off as fast as they attempted to leave the village to put themselves in order to attack us.15
The account of Robert Parker confirms the effectiveness of the platoon firing.
The enemy also made several attempts to come out upon us: But as they were necessarily thrown into confusion in getting over their trenches, so before they could form into any order for attacking us, we mowed them down with our platoons in such numbers, that they were always obliged to retire with great loss; and it was not possible for them to rush upon us in a disorderly manner, without running upon the very points of our Bayonets.16
By standing at eighty or ninety yards from the French defences the British infantry put themselves outside truly effective range, so that when the French tried to counter-attack and came out of Blenheim they had to leave the protection of their defences and move closer to the British in order to form up. This placed them within effective range of the British platoons. The alternative was to just attack in a rush, which was also not a practical option.
Having given up trying to capture the village of Blenheim, Cutts kept the French, who had twenty-seven battalions to Cutts’s sixteen, bottled up in the village, relying on steady platoon firing to do so.
All this while the village of Blenheim had been incessantly attacked by the Lord Cutts, who having found it impracticable to enter that place sword in hand, as the enemy were posted, had altered his method & attacked with his Fire only. The first of his lines which was posted near the enemies intrenchments continually discharged in Platoons & the other lines relieved this & each other successively.17
Sandby’s account demonstrated how the lines were rotated while the following account of John Deane suggested this enabled them to keep supplied with ammunition. He also told how some of the attacking troops did get into Blenheim, but were unable to establish any sort of a position in there.
Att length the enemy making all the force they could upon us forced us to retreate and to quitt the village having lost a great many of our men, but we rallied againe, having received some fresh ammunition, resolving to give the enemy another salute. So that as soon as they perceived our designe they beat a parley.18
Bottled up in the village the French were unable to make use of their superior numbers while suffering dreadfully from the British platoon fire; eventually they surrendered.
The effectiveness of infantry against cavalry was also demonstrated in the centre of the battlefield where the Comte de Merode-Westerloo led an attack of French cavalry that was initially successful as it drove Marlborough’s cavalry back.
I charged with all the men I could rally, and I had the good luck to defeat my adversaries and push them back to the brink of the stream – but I had no wish to recross it, for I could see they still had five lines of cavalry. However, I failed to notice that they had brought their infantry well forward and they killed and wounded many of our horses at thirty paces. This was promptly followed by an unauthorised but definite movement to the rear by my men.19
The actions of the British infantry at Blenheim against both infantry and cavalry demonstrated a continuing commitment to maximising the effectiveness of infantry firepower by getting close to the enemy, even if that meant having to endure the enemy’s fire to do so.
The battle of Ramilles in 1706 was won by Marlborough’s brilliant use of terrain to move his troops to gain local superiority over the French and is best known for the massive cavalry action that decided the outcome of the battle.20 By comparison with Blenheim the surviving accounts of the battle supplied little information about how the British infantry fought. However, it was during the winter that followed that the next major change took place in the manner in which the infantry delivered their firepower. That winter Lieutenant General Ingoldsby was appointed commander-in-chief in Flanders while the troops were in their winter quarters and Marlborough and most of the general officers were in England.21 Ingoldsby was the governor of Ghent, where thirteen British battalions were to spend the winter.22 It is clear from correspondence that Ingoldsby was busy with the training of the infantry in something new. Unfortunately not all the relevant correspondence appears to have survived, such as the letters from Ingoldsby to which Adam Cardonnel, Marlborough’s secretary, replied on 16 December 1706:
I received yesterday by the Ostend Packet the honours of your letter of the 10th instant and this morning by way of the Brill that of the 19th and have laid them before my Lord Duke who approves entirely of what you are doing relating to the Exercise of the Foot. You see by the enclosed the method I have taken to acquaint the General of the Foot with it that he may have nothing to object to you on that score.23
It is clear from the need for Marlborough’s approval and Cardonnel’s remark about keeping the infantry’s commander informed that something of some significance was afoot. The first clue to what was happening appears in a letter from Ingoldsby to Marlborough from Ghent on 31 December 1706.
My Lord I have be-gon to exercise all the adjutants, sargants, and corporals, who are all-reddy pretty perfect, and mightelly pleased that your Grace has thought fitt to put them upon one exersise
Itt is Imposable to tell your Grace the disorder thay weare in, not two regamts exersising a lik, nor anney one companney off Granadrs eable to exersis with the Battalyone so that if your Ldship had a mind to see the Line exersise, all the Granadrs off the armey must have stood still, and not to Regamts eable to perforum a like, which I hope is prevented, and will appeare to your sattysffacksion, iff I can have the recruits over in time.24
At the time of Ingoldsby’s letter the last official drill issued to the English and Scots armies had been The Exercise of the Foot with the Evolutions that appeared in 1690 and was last issued in 1693 with Mackay’s Rules. A further edition did appear in Dublin in 1701, but was simply a reprint of the 1690 version without Mackay’s Rules.25 This drill was written when battalions were armed with matchlock muskets and pikes. With their disappearance and replacement with flintlocks and bayonets it is perhaps not surprising that by the War of the Spanish Succession the drill of the infantry varied from regiment to regiment and even within regiments between the line companies and the grenadiers. It was to correct this state of affairs that Marlborough ‘thought fitt to put them upon one exersise’.26
Ingoldsby’s letter also demonstrates how new drill was disseminated amongst the regiments. First the regimental adjutants and NCOs were gathered together and taught the new drill. Once proficient they returned to their regiments and taught it to the other officers and soldiers.27 It is clear, however, that Ingoldsby was doing more than just ensuring a uniformity of drill. He was also introducing something completely new, as his next letter to Marlborough, written from Ghent on 2 March 1707, makes clear: ‘I suppose Majr Peniteere will give your Grace an acct how forward both officiers, and souldiers are in the exercise you were pleas’d to cumande, to perforum which as well as the ffirings upon the Queens Berthday, I have contriv’d without toutching one grayne off her majys pouder, but what the souldiers brought with them into Garrison.’28 This reference to ‘ffirings’ provides evidence of the first use of firings in the British army.
Prior to this date each platoon in a battalion had fired singly, in turn, along the length of the battalion. A firing was the grouping together of a number of platoons that c
ould either fire one by one within the firing or altogether. The essential point was that these platoons were not grouped physically together, but distributed along the whole front of a battalion. Furthermore there were only three of these firings. This development overcame the main danger of the older system, which was stated clearly by Humphrey Bland some years later.29 The problem with each platoon firing in turn along the line of a battalion was that whole sections of the line could be left unloaded and therefore vulnerable to a sudden attack, as had been seen at Killiekrankie and Fleurus. If the first platoon to fire in a wing was ready as the sixth platoon fired it meant that the four between them were still reloading and as little as one sixth of a battalion was ready to fire at any time. The adoption of firings meant that the platoons reloading, ready to fire or firing were distributed more evenly along a battalion. Bland was writing in the mid-1720s about the way the Dutch fired and it is clear that they had continued to fire in the same way throughout the War of the Spanish Succession. Among the papers of Willem Baron van Wassenaer, colonel of the First Dutch Guards Battalion, are instructions dating from 1713 on how firing was to be carried out.30 They are, in substance, the same as Douglass’s instructions.
It is also possible that there were other reasons for the change. The older system depended on each platoon reloading and being ready to fire again in the time it took the other five in a wing of a battalion to fire. With only three firings, reloading had to be carried out in the time that the other two firings took to fire. This suggests that with the increase in the speed of loading resulting from the introduction of the flintlock and the cartridge the reloading time may have been reduced to such an extent that platoons had found themselves loaded and ready to fire, but having to wait their turn while the other five platoons finished firing – not an easy thing to do in the heat of battle. Support for this possibility comes from Mackay’s remark that just four platoons could keep up a continuous fire with matchlock muskets and bandoleers.31 Concentrating the fire of a battalion into three firings also meant that a heavier fire could be delivered in a shorter time, overwhelming the enemy more quickly and avoiding a protracted firefight. Moreover, this form of firing could match, if not outweigh, the intensity of the initial fire of a French battalion and then be maintained while the French intensity fell off.
That Ingoldsby was successful in his enterprise is clear from an account of a review held on 30 May 1707.
The Duke of Marlborough review’d all the British Corps, who exercised and fired four Rounds gradually before him, and that by the signal of the waving of a Pair of Colours for each Word of Command, performed by Colonel William Blakeney, on Top of our Pontons, posted a little in the Front thereof; attended by each Drum-Major with a Drum, in the Front of their respective Regiments, who, at each wave of the Colours, gave a tap on his Drum, answerable to and for each Word of Command; the which each Regiment observed to perform accordingly: And soon afterward he review’d each other Corps of the Army, who also in the like manner exercised and fired gradually before him.32
Another account of the same review described how ‘all the English foote exercised by signall of coulers & beat of drium, and every brigade fired in platoons before his Grace; in which exercise the English gott great applause of the foreigners.’33
The first real test of this new method of firing the platoons did not come until June 1708 at Wynendael. A large French force attempted to intercept an important allied convoy taking ammunition and supplies to the allies besieging Lille. It was confronted by a much smaller allied force under the command of General Webb. Sir Winston Churchill described the following battle as ‘a striking instance of the superior fire-discipline which was so marked a feature of Marlborough’s infantry training’.34 One contemporary account describes:
The regiments and grenadiers making such a continual fire as forced their two wings on to their centre and obliged the whole to retire in the greatest confusion, notwithstanding all the efforts their officers could make by encouragement or violence to keep them up, so that they only fired at a distance on our lines which was returned, advancing by platoons as at their exercise with all the order imaginable.35
Another account also draws attention to the precision with which the infantry delivered their fire: ‘our foot made such a fire as never troops made more regular at exercise.’36 The new firings clearly allowed the battalions to keep up a continuous, effective and sustained fire.
The following month, July, brought one of Marlborough’s great victories, Oudenarde.37 This was something of an encounter battle, with both sides feeding troops into the fight as they arrived. The theme of close and disciplined fire continued in the eyewitness accounts: ‘Our two battalions of Guards, together with the two brigades of English ffoote ware come up, advanced upon the enemy who boldly bore down towards us, and having rec’d there fire without much damage, we gave them a merry salute, firing into there verry faces, the wch. they could not abide, but turned tayle and never faced more.’38
The theme of receiving the enemy’s fire and getting close before returning fire and its effectiveness was clearly demonstrated here. The application of the controlled and disciplined nature of platoon fire was also described: ‘Half our Army, immediately advanced on with undaunted Courage, and vigorously attack’d the Enemies Right Wing next to them, and most open, and elsewhere, with small Shot, as regular and gradual as the Time and Ground would permit.’39
Another description of the fighting at Oudenarde refers to a ‘colour platoon’, implying one central platoon, something not found in the platoon firing of Mackay or Douglass where the platoons were evenly divided between two wings.40 The explanation for this and details of the way the new firings were organised were to be found in Ireland.
Following the winter spent training the infantry in Ghent Lieutenant General Richard Ingoldsby had been appointed as commander-in-chief in Ireland. There he found the troops ‘very defective in their discipline, especially the foot’ and consequently, as Robert Parker records, Ingoldsby wrote to Marlborough requesting that Parker be sent to Ireland ‘in order to introduce among them the discipline practiced in Flanders’.41 Parker had been the adjutant of the Royal Irish Regiment and consequently responsible for the training of his regiment. It was particularly appropriate for Parker to be summoned as Ingoldsby was the colonel of the Royal Irish. Moreover, some years later the regiment’s then major and acting lieutenant colonel, Richard Kane, wrote: ‘The Regiment of Foot that I serv’d in, is well known by the Title of the Royal Regiment of Ireland, from which Regiment I may without Vanity say, our British Infantry had the Ground-work of their present Discipline.’42 This combination of circumstantial evidence, Ingoldsby’s training initiative in Ghent, his choice of Parker and Kane’s remark, suggests that it might have been in the Royal Irish that the use of firings was first developed. Moreover, as Parker seems from the following letter to have been instrumental in devising drill it is possible that he was the officer responsible for the idea.
On 13 September 1708 Parker wrote from Dublin to Lieutenant Colonel Sterne, acting as colonel of the Royal Irish in Ingoldsby’s absence.
Dear Collo
I have been labouring hard wth ye two Regimts in Town in showing them & ye ajudts our fireings, the Genll is come from his progress & will see these Regimts perform in a day or two after which I shall be going for Corke and when ever the wether permits I must be wth ye Regimts there & at Kinsale.
According to yor directions I brought the Genll to consent to our Marching in four Grand divisions and I have undertaken to form ye Square on ye March which is done in half ye time you are drawing up ye Batl . . . [at this point Parker gives a lengthy and detailed description of forming square on the march]. I thought fitt to let you know what I have don in this affair that I might have an opinion of you & ye Major on it.43
As already shown, the infantry in Flanders were taught the new exercise and firings by training the adjutants and NCOs first. Parker’s letter shows that much the sa
me process was followed in Dublin and it is tempting to suggest that it might have been him that carried out the training in Ghent. As Ingoldsby needed to bring Parker to Ireland to introduce the troops there to Flanders’ practice, it suggests that Flanders’ practice was developed in isolation in theatre in Flanders, that it was not written or published, and that it was developed and transmitted by word of mouth. This is not surprising as the British regiments in Flanders were not rotated in and out of theatre as they are today, thus there was no opportunity for the new firings to be transmitted from regiment to regiment through the army. Furthermore, the close proximity of the British regiments in Flanders to each other meant that everything could be achieved by word of mouth and there was no need for written instructions. There was certainly no published manual of the period that described the new organisation of platoons into firings. It was even possible that Parker did not have his own written version, or, even if he did, that the drill was transmitted by instruction and demonstration rather than by being copied. Houlding has suggested that the drill was copied in manuscript; however, this seems not to have been the case.44 Parker described how ‘in order to introduce among them the discipline practiced in Flanders . . . I continued two years disciplining the Foot of that Kingdom, in which time all the Regiments of Foot passed through my hands.’45 It is clear that he instructed them directly.
Fortunately it is possible to examine in detail what the new drill was and how the new firings were organised as two manuscript versions of the drill survived. One had a first page that was headed ‘The Exercise of Firelock and Bayonet with the sevll Fireings of the Foot as they are to follow Each other according to the method appointed by his Excie Lieut Genll Ingoldsby’.46 The other has no such heading and is superficially different, but in substance it is exactly the same, which further supports the idea that this drill was not copied from a master manuscript, but rather that each officer took his own notes on the new drill.47 The first bears the name of Bryan Mahoney who was an ensign and subsequently a lieutenant in Mountjoy’s regiment until placed on half pay on the Irish establishment when that regiment was disbanded in 1714. The second bears the name of a Captain John Foster of Dulwich, who it has not been possible to identify.
Destructive and Formidable: British Infantry Firepower 1642-1756 Page 10