Napoleonic and independance wars

Napoleonic and Independence wars, are the wars that took place in the periods between 1770 and 1820 approximately. These wars are sometime considered a direct product of the philosophical current at the time: The enlightenment.

The wars in this period include, the United States of America independence wars from the British Empire. the French revolution, the seven years war between the colonies possessed by the richest families in Europe (the Hohenzollern, the Hasburg and the Bourbon), the post-revolution wars or Napoleonic wars, and the independence of the american colonies of the kingdoms of Spain and Portugal.

These wars have an interesting quality that differentiate them from all the previous armed conflicts. Mainly the standardization of the military units: infantry, cavalry and artillery; And the subsequent modification of combat techniques. Its worth noticing that the geographical extension of the wars was increasing and becoming a new powerful and decisive factor to account for. An clear example being Napoleon's invasion to Russia in 1812.

The ever increasing need for bigger and better trained armies, led to the creation of drafted citizen soldiers, and the implementation of cheap small arms into the infantry, clearly shaping the political order at the time; The big number of soldiers that composed the army, led to the creation, and later standardization, of army divisions and corps; Which facilitated communication, organization of the big massive armies that took part in the wars.

A representative army, not only from the historical point of view, but also from the point of view interesting to us, is Napoleon's army; More specifically, the army that he used in his campaign against Russia.

The campaign against Russia took place on 1812. Napoleon's army was one of the biggest and better trained armies in the world. Napoleon had an impressive military career as commander, and had an impressive 16-year long interval of undefeated battles. His army consisted of 370000 infantry units, 80000 cavalry units and 1400 artillery units; However impressive the number were (and still are under today's standards) the army was only half french; The other half was a unstable mixture of defeated Germans, Italians, Spaniards and Portuguese troops. Ont he other hand of the conflict was Russia with three major armies which together the were able to gather 180000 Infantry units, 40000 cavalry units and 800 artillery units.

Napoleon himself took charge of the logistics of the invasion. He was aware of the possible risk his campaign will undergo as they marched into the vast Russian territories. He knew the enemies would run towards the interior of the country, we knew they would do their best to left nothing for the Napoleonic troop to use, they would burn their own cities and crops just to make Napoleon's army starve and demoralize; In response to this, Napoleon decided to took with them all the necessary food and garments they would use during the invasion; He designed the supply routes, which included over 10000 wagon pulled by oxen. The wagon were build without any specifications other than carry as much food as possible, and the oxen were planned to be part of the menu once the provisions of the wagon have been used. All this minor details were taken into account by the great commander.

The Russian army was aware of the difficulties the French would have to undergo if the war was to be prolonged for too long. They were well aware of the demoralizing effect of their retreats, the vastness of the Russian territories, and most significant of all, the crudeness of the Russian winter.

Napoleon, as great commander as he was, left Paris hoping to obtain a victory in 4 weeks or less. He was confident the Russians would surrender without resistance once his army had crossed the Polish borders. He was wrong; Indeed, 4 weeks later, Napoleon had change his war strategy and his army was now marching towards Moscow. The army had been reduced by 150000 units at a rate of about 3000 units a day due to malnutrition, exhaustion, and infections.

By September that year Napoleon's army had reach Moscow. They took it without any resistance (since the Russian army, and Russian inhabitants left the city with all their belongings when they saw the french army coming) and had 2/3 of the city burned down. At this moment the remaining soldiers had their bag filled with some extra clothes, some food and many treasures , mostly gold relics and golden objects gained over the course of the war. It was customary among the soldiers to lighten their bags, by leaving behind the extra clothes that seemed unnecessary in September. At the en of September, the remaining 120000 soldiers started their march back to Paris.

Napoleon had calculated that winter would come until him, and his army had reach Poland, but that year, an abnormally cold winter, came abnormally soon. It is estimated that less than 25000 soldiers came back to Paris after the campaign.

This is a short abstract of Napoleon's campaign of invading Russia in 1812. But it is enough for us to realize the important role of materials in this context. We see, one more time the urge to find the optimum combinations of weight and strength, flexibility and toughness, between specialized components and multifunctional components. And all this in mass production, and for the least possible price.

A few examples that illustrate how decisive could have turned the right pick of materials include, the material from which the wagons were build. A wagon build out of fast burning wood could have help resists the inclement crude Russian winter. Oak wood is, in recent times, the best possible wood; It burns the longest, hottest, and basically the most efficient BTU available. Oak wood is not the strongest wood, but Napoleon's army didn't really need that.

The typical decision among soldier of sacrificing spare clothes to gain space where to put their treasures might have been alleviated by better clothing. It is true that in the 1800's there were no GoreTex membranes, Polartec insulation, or waterproof material like there are today, but many useful clothing was intentionally left aside because of its visual appearance. It was very important to fight in the army uniform and wear the nation's (or royal family's) colours in the uniform. A thick cloak, although ugly, might have offered better insulation during cold seasons, a dry place to sleep, it could be worn opened, thus offering good ventilation, or simply get detached in hot days.

Another example, this time of something that actually happened, as opposed to something that could have happened, is the material of which the cannons were made. During the seven years war, Napoleon's army had perfected their metallurgy, and the cuspid of this development was the implementation of the Gribeauval guns. The Gribeauval guns where a series of artillery units that in average weighted 2/3ths of the enemies cannons, thus allowing Napoleons army to advance faster and break the line formations more effectively (One of Napoleon's main war strategies.) As a comparison, the British 12-pounder cannons weighted around 6500 pound including the carriage and the limber; The Gribeauval 12-pounder only weighted 4367 pounds.

The technology used to create these weapons lied on the reduction of the manufacturing tolerance of the cannons. To achieve this, instead of pouring molten iron or bronze around a clay cylinder (and later removing the cylinder), these guns casted the entire solid volume, and later drilled the whole inside the iron or bronze core. This had numerous advantages, for example, in early cannons, the amount of power required to make a cannon ball flight a certain distance was bigger since most of the power was dissipated through the imperfections of the inside cylinder. The increased amount of powder made the mechanical loads present in the cannon very big, and this needed the implementation of external metal rings around the cannon tube to absorb the shock of the explosion. With the advent of the new method, the amount of powder required was smaller (since the imperfections in the inner cylinder were also smaller) and the loads the cannon tube had to withstand were totally absorbed by the cannon alone. This allowed the metallurgist to spare the extra metallic rings ,thus lightening the whole piece, and reducing the amount of material needed to produce every cannon.

The french army had the best artillery in Europe, this led Napoleon to create the French empire as we know it today, and some of its glory can be traced back to the understanding of new materials and new, smarter, ways of using them in our favor.