Review of Imperial Bayonets: Tactics of the Napoleonic Battery, Battalion and Brigade as Found in Contemporary Regulations

by Terry Doherty

Hardcover: 320 pages
Publisher: Greenhill Books (September 1996)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1853672505
ISBN-13: 978-1853672507

Overall the book is a quite detailed examination of the organization, formations, weapons and tactics in use during the period from 1792-1815. By necessity it also draws from drill manuals preceding this period, because armies always begin wars with their current training regimen. It contains 138 diagrams and 98 tables and charts. A veritable wealth of information.

Chapter one contains a primer on the basic organization of a company for each of the major nationalities involved in the conflicts known as the Napoleonic Wars. We are presented with the basic layout of companies showing the positions of officers and NCOs within the company. We are also shown the spacing allocated to each soldier's body within the rank and file as well as the various rates of march prescribed by the regulations of each nationality. This chapter also covers the basics of maneuvering a company on a fixed or moving pivot. It covers the effectiveness of musketry during the period and different types of fire such as volley fire and fire by two ranks. The chapter covers a lot of ground and you may want to read it twice.

Chapter two covers the organization of battalions and introduces the reader to the various types of column, line and square formations. It delves into the controversy of two versus three ranks which in the reviewer's opinion is a controversy of historians as most regulations of the period allowed for two ranks when the strength of the battalion became too low for the battalion to maintain its required frontage. The risk a two rank line ran was from cavalry. The British, the most common practicioners of the two rank line, were careful to occupy terrain less suited to cavalry or when unable to do so such as at Waterloo formed in four ranks to offset the all too real cavalry threat. The author goes into considerable detail into the issue.

Chapter three covers, for all major belligerents, the maneuvering of a battalion, evolutions to and and from column and line formation and evolutions to and from column or line, and square formation. The author also introduces a novel technique of calculating the time to conduct these evolutions. And although, the numbers should not be taken as absolutes they get us in the ball park and can give us a good understanding of the relative time different types of evolutions took to perform.

Chapter four covers the important topic of light infantry including the basic history of the use of light infantry during the 18^th century and during the Napoleonic Wars. It describes various methods for deploying skirmishers and what they should do in the event of the threat of formed infantry and cavalry.

Chapter five covers the tactics of brigades. This is the weak area of most wargamers as it is poorly understood by wargamers and historians alike. The French Règlement de 1791 do cover the manuevering of a brigade in Titre V, but that is not the whole story. The author consults several sources, but there are many more yet to be exploited in a modern work.

Chapter six is titled Revolutionary French Tactics, but it covers both the Revolutionary and Napoleonic periods and introduces to ordre mixte and more information on brigade and division size deployments.

Chapters seven to nine repeat the thorough analysis of infantry organization, formations and tactics for cavalry. As for infantry, it covers the locations of officers in the ranks, maneuvers, evolutions and brigade level deployments.

Chapter ten is a treatment of artillery systems in use by the major belligerents during the Napoleonic Wars. The author perhaps gives a little too much credit to Gribeauval who was very much a student of Lichtenstein, the Austrian artillery before, during and after the Seven Years War. This chapter provides the read with a wealth of technical information on the organization of batteries, the guns themselves, ammunition, limbers, carriages and caissons. The chapter concludes with a lengthy analysis of artillery practices of the various combattants.

Chapters eleven and twelve conclude the book with an analysis of combined arms and an introduction to operational considerations of the Napoleonic Wars, the area where Napoleon truly shined as a Great Captain.

All in all this is the most thorough work available covering the intricacies of the maneuvering troops on the Napoleonic battlefield. This book is a must have for anyone interested in the subject of tactics during the musket and horse era.