Linear Warfare

Linear warfare (people standing in lines) traces back to the re-emergence of infantry during the Renaissance Period. When Rome fell, hearkening the start of the dark ages, armies no longer fought in fixed formations like the Greek phalanxs or the organized cohorts of the Roman Legion. It was one mob fighting another mob (think Hastings in 1066). Cavalry, or the heavily armored knight, was the queen of the battlefield and the infantry was and unwieldy mass that surged forward when ordered.

Well, those Swiss with their organized pike formations changed all that and soon most armies began fighting in similar manner. Once again the infantrymen fought in formation that could be ordered about and moved quickly (as opposed to surging like a mass). It allowed for units that are tired to be rotated off the battlefield and replaced by fresh units. With the development of firearms, formations of supporting arquebusers (matchlock gunners) began to be integrated. Kept apart but working in conjunction with pike formations, their front rank would discharge a volley, wheel back to the rear and be replaced by the line that stood behind them. This would be repeated until all 12 (or 16) ranks delivered their volley. Pike formations stood on both sides to protect these early gunners and to offer them protection when opposing pike formations or cavalry threatened to run them down.

As gun technology became more effective (first with the wheel-lock and then the snap-haunce and finally flintlock), fewer lines were required. So, sixteen dense lines gave away to 12 lines, and fewer until it reached about three in the Napoleonic Era (even though two was common for both sides during the American Revolution). Likewise, the invention of the plug bayonet (later replaced by the socket bayonet) meant that the the gunner could now protect himself against the pikeman and the cavalryman. Hence, pike formations fell out of favor and armies relied increasingly on guns.

Now, the guns of the period were smoothbore. An undersized ball was dropped down the barrel and when fired, it would rattle along the barrel and exit the muzzle with no great degree of accuracy. In fact, with the smoothbore weapon, accuracy was not the smoothbore's virture. Volume of fire was. Why wasn't accuracy required? It wasn't needed. Why wasn't it needed? Because, if you missed the target in front of you, there was always another fellow to his left, his right or behind him to receive your bullet. You didn't need accuracy. You needed to put out more bullets to disable foes faster than your foe could disable you. Hence, soldiers stood shoulder to shoulder to ensure that solid volleys could be fired into the enemy's ranks and thereby throw him into disorder and render him vulnerable to the bayonet charge. Shock by the bayonet, would follow after one's volleys broke the enemy's morale. Another perceived advantage of having the men standing shoulder to shoulder is that, well, the men were simple brutes incapable of conducting themselves in a soldierly manner in the absence of his officer; who happened to be of aristocratic birth. By packing the men shoulder to shoulder, the officer to exert greater command and control over his men. Disperse them in loose order and they won't be able to operate effectively (so it was thought). Thus, besides maximizing the effectiveness of the smoothbore gun, linear warfare offered greater command and control.

There is a legend that Americans won the Revolution by fighting with Indian tactics. Untrue. Most battles were fought using linear warfare and many of them were lost. Some battles were exception and King's Mountain, Lexington & Concord are examples of our "cowardly and skulking" fighting techniques beating the professional British soldier. Saratoga (both battles) has good examples of riflemen using Indian warfare supported by light infantry to defeat the British. However, Brandywine, Princeton, Monmouth, Guildford Courthouse, Newhall, Siege of Charleston, Siege of Yorktown were all conventionally fought.

The tradition of linear warfare began being broken with the French & Indian War when the French and their Indian allies defeated Maj. Gen. Edward Braddock in 1755. A lot of light infantry techniques (open order, independent firing, faster moving, more independent units) were used by the victorious British and their American colonists. Most of this was forgotten after the war and the American revolution saw a brief revival of those techniques. Both sides had light infantry. The Americans to support our riflemen and the British to counter the Patriot riflemen.

However, it wasn't until the French Revolution that light infantry tactics were accepted universally. The French levee en masse made it necessary and by the end of the Napoleonic Wars, virtually all armies had skirmishers. However, all armies still relied heavily on linear tactics. Linear tactics were still being used during the Crimean War and shortly after that, the American Civil War. However, as the American Civil War progressed, the American soldiers used it only to move into battle but thereafter, contrary to the tactics, dug in. By 1864, the armies had learned it was suicidal to attack entrenched positions. Still, linear tactics were used well into the Austro-Prussian War (1866) which was the last major war for one side to be equipped with the rifle-musket (Austro-Hungarians had the Lorenz rifle musket and those cheating Prussians had the breech-loading Dreyse Needle Rifle). Linear tactics were still used even when both belligerents had breech-loading weapons (Franco-Prussian War in 1871).

A word about rifles. Rifles are different in that their barrels had curved grooves cut in surface. A tightly fitted ball (either a ball casted to be fit the barrel or an undersized ball with a greased patch) was introduced into the barrel and rammed down. Upon firing, the grooves imparted a spin to the ball, causing it fly farther and much straighter than a ball would fly if fired from a smoothbore musket. The range of a rifle was minimally 200 yards, or twice the distance of a smoothbore musket (given that the musket armed soldier knew how to aim - otherwise, muskets were generally effective out to about 40 yards). While rifles were more accurate, their disadvantage of taking a long time to load (up to one minute as opposed to three to five shots a minute for muskets) meant that the rifle was never serious considered as a military weapon. Additionally, rifles were not adapted to take bayonets so once the rifle was empty, the rifle equipped soldier was defenseless against his bayonet armed counterpart or from a cavalryman.

The development of the minie ball meant that for the first time, a rifle could be loaded as faster as the musket. So, you a soldier could have the rate of fire of a musket but with the accuracy of a rifle. In fact, the minie rifle's conical bullet has a superior ballistic coefficient than the round ball (more wind resistent, less susceptible to drift) and could therefore hit out farther than a rifle fired round ball. Whereas only the very best round-ball riflemen could hit a man at 400 yards, it was easily accomplished with a minie ball gun. The Civil War was the first war that it was possible for all soldiers to be armed with a rifle. Though initially in the first two years of the war the smoothbore musket was the predominant infantry arm, by late '63 and early '64, most infantry could be equipped with rifles (though some units retained their smoothbores until the end). According to Prof. Hess, the increase # of rifles did not make the Civil War battlefield any more dangerous. I can explain why, but that's covered in my book.

For more reading, might I suggest Paddy Griffith's book, Civil War Battle Tactics. How the Civil War was Fought by Brent Nosworthy is also an excellent read. Prof. Earl Hess book on the rifle musket is also good.