Soldiers marching.

[Badger]

I was wondering for those who are more knowledgeable about this.

 

 

How much could your typical group of soldiers march in a day? In an hour?

 

And what of calvary?

 

And for later periods how far and how much effort for moving artillery pieces?

[Curufea]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

See this link to a previous thread on the same subject-

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=55292

[Markdoc]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

See this link to a previous thread on the same subject-

http://www.herogames.com/forums/showthread.php?t=55292

 

Yeah, what he said.

 

But as a rough rule of thumb:

 

Group carrying supplies on wagons or seige gear, 8-10 miles a day.

 

Group all or most on foot, carrying their own gear, about 20 miles a day (if they are well disciplined)

 

Group riding and carrying their own gear around 25 miles a day

 

Group riding carrying their own gear with plenty of remounts, abot 30 miles

 

Figure than in the short term the last 3 groups can double their mileage, but they start to straggle, lose men who drop out, pile on the LTE loss, etc and that they can triple the distance for a day or tow by pushing themselves to the absolute limit, but will disintegrate as afighting force after a couple of days like that.

 

cheers, Mark

[MorpheousXO]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

for some reason I always find this kind of info interesting... I should really do some research on actual mass combats, I suppose, and other aspects (travel, logistics, whatnot).

[Edsel]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Group all or most on foot, carrying their own gear, about 20 miles a day (if they are well disciplined)

 

Group riding and carrying their own gear around 25 miles a day

Yeah being mounted doesn't really give you a lot of extra distance in a day. The primary benefit is that you can carry more stuff. The horses may be faster but they are constrained by terrain that us primates can scramble over. This often prevents them from taking the most direct route.

[Badger]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Yeah, what he said.

 

But as a rough rule of thumb:

 

Group carrying supplies on wagons or seige gear, 8-10 miles a day.

 

Group all or most on foot, carrying their own gear, about 20 miles a day (if they are well disciplined)

 

Group riding and carrying their own gear around 25 miles a day

 

Group riding carrying their own gear with plenty of remounts, abot 30 miles

 

Figure than in the short term the last 3 groups can double their mileage, but they start to straggle, lose men who drop out, pile on the LTE loss, etc and that they can triple the distance for a day or tow by pushing themselves to the absolute limit, but will disintegrate as afighting force after a couple of days like that.

 

cheers, Mark

 

Yeah, this was what I was hoping for, kind of a rough estimate. Though I did like that thread, Curufea pulled out. (I usually get more than I expect, here:thumbup: ).

[assault]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Yeah being mounted doesn't really give you a lot of extra distance in a day. The primary benefit is that you can carry more stuff. The horses may be faster but they are constrained by terrain that us primates can scramble over. This often prevents them from taking the most direct route.

 

Armies usually follow roads where they exist, or established paths/routes where they don't. They don't just wander randomly over the countryside.

 

The main thing with horses is that you can't push them as hard as you can with men. Infantry will keep marching when horses start dying.

 

The other thing to consider is the availability of fodder. You either carry grain with you, or you have to allow horses time to graze on available fodder - if it exists.

 

The main factor inhibiting the movement of large forces (armies) is the speed of their baggage trains. Smaller forces can force march over relatively short times and distances, but big armies usually travel at the speed of an ox- or horse-drawn cart. Usually on poor quality roads, often in lousy weather.

 

And that's another reason why they tend to follow set routes - you can't just drive these vehicles around anywhere.

 

It's a wonder armies managed to travel at all.

[McCoy]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

And now you understand why "home court" is such an advantage.

[Badger]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Armies usually follow roads where they exist, or established paths/routes where they don't. They don't just wander randomly over the countryside.

 

The main thing with horses is that you can't push them as hard as you can with men. Infantry will keep marching when horses start dying.

 

The other thing to consider is the availability of fodder. You either carry grain with you, or you have to allow horses time to graze on available fodder - if it exists.

 

The main factor inhibiting the movement of large forces (armies) is the speed of their baggage trains. Smaller forces can force march over relatively short times and distances, but big armies usually travel at the speed of an ox- or horse-drawn cart. Usually on poor quality roads, often in lousy weather.

 

And that's another reason why they tend to follow set routes - you can't just drive these vehicles around anywhere.

 

It's a wonder armies managed to travel at all.

 

 

Right, I had figured all that factored in. I've studied enough civil war to know that much. (I just never hear the distances they talk about )

[Badger]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

And now you understand why "home court" is such an advantage.

 

 

 

Not to mention, the "home" team can rest up somewhat while they wait for the game and be all that much stronger

 

 

Edit: And of course, an @$$ like me would send a few little calvary units to pull "hit&runs" all down the trail to further bog them down and drop their morale.

 

ooh, and a minefield in the road. MWAHAHAHA (depending on tech level of course)

[McCoy]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Not to mention, the "home" team can rest up somewhat while they wait for the game and be all that much stronger

 

 

Edit: And of course, an @$$ like me would send a few little calvary units to pull "hit&runs" all down the trail to further bog them down and drop their morale.

 

ooh, and a minefield in the road. MWAHAHAHA (depending on tech level of course)

If your tech level is too low for a mindfield, try caltrops. Better yet, install the mind field in the center of the road, then sew caltrops on the shoulders.

[Badger]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

If your tech level is too low for a mindfield' date=' try caltrops. Better yet, install the mind field in the center of the road, then sew caltrops on the shoulders.[/quote']

 

ooh caltrops I forgot about those?

 

 

MWA HA HA

[Spence]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Remember the weather. As assault mentions above. Most early roads were just dirt, not paved. Even a little rain could turn roads bad. Add in a few hundreds of infantry and cavalry plus ox carts and the road become a quagmire that could reduce the rate of travel to 1 or 2 miles a day. I have read of accounts where heavy items like siege engine parts and cannon actually get swallowed up in the mud. Even open fields could become impassible to carts and sledges. Cavalry and infantry could cross open soggy ground if they dispersed into smaller units and took different routes. Of course that turned your force from an army to penny-packets to be snapped up and destroyed. Choke points like river fords could really slow down an army. Usually the "Campaign Season" was the local "not winter" and "not rainy" season.

[assault]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Usually the "Campaign Season" was the local "not winter" and "not rainy" season.

 

As an example of an exception, at times in Scandinavian history, winter was the preferred campaign season, because frozen rivers made better roads than what passed for roads during the rest of the year!

 

But that is an exception.

[Spence]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

As an example of an exception, at times in Scandinavian history, winter was the preferred campaign season, because frozen rivers made better roads than what passed for roads during the rest of the year!

 

But that is an exception.

 

 

Excellent point! After you mentioned it I think I remember seeing that somewhere before. But I cannot recall. It does make perfect sense, given the climate and terrain.

[assault]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Excellent point! After you mentioned it I think I remember seeing that somewhere before. But I cannot recall. It does make perfect sense' date=' given the climate and terrain.[/quote']

 

I've actually been trying to find a reference to it. All I can find is a comment to the effect of it occurring in medieval (post-"Viking") Sweden.

 

Anyway, it's plausible enough. We know stuff like the battle on Lake Peipus happened, anyway.

[Markdoc]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Hmmm. I don't have references in English handy, but here is what I have read:

 

The preferred late campaigning season (there was also a summer campaign season, after the fields were prepared and sown) in the far north was split in two - first late autumn/early winter (basically after the first hard frost) - say around late October - sometimes earlier, sometimes later.

 

At that point, the harvest was in, and your fighting men freed from overseeing that and/or working. You had plenty of food. The ground would be frozen solid, making for better marching conditions and movement of supplies on wagons. The rivers would not be frozen yet, meaning you could also shift supplies by boat. This was time for strategic movement and establishing your winter base.

 

Depending on the weather, the early campaign season would normally (but not always) stop around the end of December, simply because the weather was getting too bitter and the first serious snows starting. Soldiers would hole up, apart from short-distance raids, drink Christmas/Jul in (the christmas celebration up here is still called Jul, the old pagan name, and it long predates the arrival of Christianity, and according to old writings, Christianity didn't change the festival much). In Febuary, when the worst of the snows were over but the rivers still frozen, the war parties would go out again.

 

Now there'd be enough snow/ice to make sleds practical (some early scandinavian wagons were built so you could take the wheels off and swap them for runners) and the frozen rivers made excellent roads, for two reasons. 1. They were nice and flat and the wind tends to keep them free of piled snow. 2. They run through the lowlands, whereas roads often went by more direct routes and often held to the high ground - meaning lots of up and down - a killer if you have to shift all your own food - and in a scandinavian winter you did: there'd be no foraging. 3. Most settlements were built on waterways - meaning there was almost always a river that went were you wanted.

 

That lasted until mid-march - early April by the latest - at that stage the thaw would start and you wanted to be home before then. The thaw would turn the ground to mud and the ice breaking up would render rivers unpassable for both men and boats. Paradoxically, the beginning of spring was the traditional dying time in Scandinavia and Russia: it's when the old and the weak, having used up their reserves during the winter, would usually die and when food supplies were at their lowest - before new stuff would start growing. Add to that impassable roads and rivers....

 

It's why Easter used to be such a big deal here and was even before christianity came.

 

cheers, Mark

[tkdguy]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

This one is more for Renaissance armies, but it has some useful information:

 

http://www.syler.com/

[Sir Ofeelya]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

At the Battle of Austerlitz (2 December 1805), Marshal Davout'sIII Corps marched 110 km (about 70 miles in 48 hours and went in to action when immediately. Apparently he had hardly any stragglers. That was on crappy early 19th C roads.

[Starwolf]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

I personally consider the Roman Legions to be one the finest examples of military excellence. They were trained to march 25 miles per day carrying a full kit on their backs... in armor.

 

Linky: http://library.thinkquest.org/26602/onthemarch.htm

 

What this doesn't mention is that the legions could do this day after day, and at the end of a march, each day would construct a triangle shaped earthwork walled encampment. Alternatively they could at the end of a march go straight into battle. Julius Ceaser actually reduced the size of his legions to make them more mobile and manueverable, legend tells that in one campaign in gaul he moved his entire army over 50 miles in a forced march,, and went straight into battle.

 

Modern infantry on the other hand are constrained to just a few miles (around 10) per day, and that is in good weather, with modern roads. Of course if they are mechanized, it's a whole different matter.

 

[Markdoc]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

What this doesn't mention is that the legions could do this day after day' date=' and at the end of a march, each day would construct a triangle shaped earthwork walled encampment.[/quote']

 

Just to pick a couple of minor nits, the normal roman schedule called for 1 days marching, 1 day rest. And under normal circumstances, they didn't march in armour: you can see depictions of marching legionaries, who are depicted wearing the thoracomachus or subarmilis, a padded coat which was worn under the armour. Marching in armour was only something you'd do when there was significant risk of combat - otherwise (as far as we can tell from carved images) the armour seems to have been rolled up and attached to the legionaire's pack (although there are pictures of marching legionaires carrying the lorica segmentata (the traditional "overlapping plates" type of armour) on a wooden pole.

 

But it is true that they could keep this pace up for much longer than a day and did so on plenty of occasions. To keep in shape, 3 times a month a legionary had to do an 18 mile route march with 60 pounds of equipment,armour and weapons to carry. It's not for nothing the reformed army called itself "Marius' mules"

 

 

Modern infantry on the other hand are constrained to just a few miles (around 10) per day' date=' and that is in good weather, with modern roads. Of course if they are mechanized, it's a whole different matter.[/quote']

 

Again, a minor point - modern infantry are supposed to be able to cover 20 miles a day with all their gear (not that different from 2000 years ago!) - and if in good shape and forced marching, can do more. A good example of this was the 42 Commando of the Royal Marines during the Falklands war. The Commandos landed at San Carlos carrying approximately 120-145 pounds of equipment per man. A typical load consisted of two mortar rounds (26 lbs.), personal weapon and ammunition (50 lbs.), 2 water bottles, food for 48 hours, sleeping bag, shelter, spare clothing and other special equipment required by the individual or his squad. With this load, 42 Commando made a "Big Yomp" (forced march) of 80 miles in three days across boggy, wet, hilly ground during freezing cold weather.

 

Just to qualify to enter the NZ army, you need to be able to do a 10 mile march cross country with the standard 62 lb kit in less than 2 hours, then immediately do a 18 ft rope climb, up and over a 6ft wall, cross a 9ft ditch and finish with a 700 ft fireman’s carry. After that lot, doing 10 miles in a day on roads would be a doddle.

 

cheers, Mark

[Markdoc]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Oh and if you've ever wondered what the air/speed velocity of a swallow carrying a coconut is...

 

or at least the metabolic requirements of a marching Roman legionary were, here's more information than you probably ever wanted

http://bjsm.bmj.com/cgi/reprint/32/3/261.pdf

 

Cheers, Mark

 

OK, I lied about the swallows

[Lawnmower Boy]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Marching armies is _very_ complicated. The bigger the army, the more you have to know, and execute on the landscape in order to move quickly. One of the reasons the Romans got around so well is that their infrastructural costs were so low. Low cavalry strenghs will be punished harshly by a well endowed enemy, but not having it has its advantages.

A well-organised army is actually going to cope with the landscape pretty well.

Here's what an organised army looks like as it marches through your countryside.

i) a screen of light cavalry, often a herdsman militia that might be anything from Romanian mercenaries to Volga Kalmycks moves through. Probably organised in "hundreds" that are actually closer to 20--60 men, they ride light, nimble horses with range-trained digestive systems. They're not the animals of choice for mounted combat, but they stay out of trouble well. The idea is that these guys generate intelligence for you and trouble for your enemies. Don't approach these guys and offer to sell intelligence. Wait for....

ii) A formal vanguard consisting of a mixture of staff dragoons (a guard of experienced country men, probably on good horses, accompanying a staff officer who is going to draw/survey the countryside and regular cavalry, probably carabiniers and mounted grenadiers if available, who will take local fortified points at first shock.

iii) the first dismounted element consists of crack infantry (probably the army's grenadier companies grouped into a "corps", light infantry if you've got'em) and probably the army's pioneer corps, as grenadiers above. The first general will appear on the scene, the Major-General of the Day, who will be tasked with organising the army's camp at the end of this stage of the march --usually, but _not necessarily_ at the end of a day's march. (Marches requiring men to sleep one or more nights in the open are not that uncommon.) This unit will build minor bridges.

iv) the main body of the army.

v) the "artillery" train; probably a more accurate rendering of the traditional language than "baggage train." The latter implies that the army has packed more books and clothes than it really needs for the trip. The former suggests that even if it isn't dragging along guns, it needs what it has in the waggons/pack animals. A typical escort is more dragoons, because you then have lots of organic horsepower to move the wagons through the countryside when things bog, ditch, break wheels and so on. There will be a workshop, too. A century of corporate records going back from 1820 are available for Russell's Flying Waggons of London (thank heavens for the early nineteenth century civil trial records, found and used by Dorian Gerhold ); they suggest 6 breakdowns/1000 waggons/hour, if I recall correctly. This unit will launch major bridges and do much of the work of building a major fortified camp/road, since any of the army's specialised equipment, such as block tackles, felling saws, shovels and picks (and assorted stuff up to and including a horse-powered sawmill. The technology, although available, is not mentioned until the 19th century, though.)

Both cited infantry marching speed and march time (per ideal one day stage) is so variable that a 20 mile day is hardy inconceivable. Sometimes you get the impression that Middle Ages people were such sticks in the mud that they had never travelled 20 miles, never mind walk that distance in a day. But even in the day a fit young man could run 100 miles a day, and often did; and, bizarrely enough, jogging for fun and fitness was hardly unknown, at least in the early 1700s.

Something to keep in mind is footwear. In an account of a battle in the 1690s, a British observer describes seeing troops coming up that they thought were Dutch, because bare-footed, but instead they proved to be French dragoons. The implication is that Dutch troops marched in clogs and kicked them off before fighting (like Highlanders) and that dragoon-boots were so awful that they weren't worn in battle. (Robert Parker's memoirs were editted and published by David Chandler).

An army like this is not likely to take the field except when there is fodder, ie standing grass crops, available. Campaigning ideally begins right at the tail-end of the spring freshette when the rivers go down, so that armies are first on the water meadows (first grass being deemed particularly healthy for horses according to a crazy Hungarian whose work is near impossible to find and), with a break at high summer and a resumption in the fall going until the very end of the harvest and a safe bit beyond. After a Christmas break you can begin planning a winter campaign, which will have to be fought out of magazines by a limited force.

(Incidentally, watch your enemies at this time of year. If they close the sluices on their rivers and begin to build up a water supply, they might well be planning a sudden campaign up a river in your territory, which they will backflood with their "waters of manoeuvre." This was a favourite trick of Louis XIV's.

[shadowcat1313]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Kipling talks about marching distances in legion terms in "Rimini" "Its 25 marches to Narbo, 45 more up the Rhone" assuming hes using Rome for a starting point, but how far is a single march?

[Captain Obvious]

Re: Soldiers marching.

 

Kipling talks about marching distances in legion terms in "Rimini" "Its 25 marches to Narbo' date=' 45 more up the Rhone" assuming hes using Rome for a starting point, but how far is a single march?[/quote']

 

A situation like that is probably very specific in regard to days of marching, and not so specific as to miles marched per day. When you're talking about a specified route, the extra time it takes to cross difficult terrain is already added in if you do it that way.