The English Army (Engels, 1863)

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Engels presumably conceived this article in late 1863, after reading a series of items on the organisation of the British army in the Allgemeine Militär-Zeitung published between August and November. He, for his part, intended to review the British army's development and contemporary condition. He must have started work on the article at the end of 1863 and written part of the text in early 1864. The article was not published in the paper. The manuscript consists of seven sheets covered with writing on both sides and numbered by the author. The end is missing. The first page is superscribed "F. E.", as in other manuscripts by Engels intended for the Allgemeine Militär-Zeitung (see Notes 292 and 298). p. 298

In a detailed review of the small work by Pétrie and James, the Allgemeine Militär-Zeitung recently described the organisation of the English army, and since then, in another article, the position of this army in the English state. What remains is only to consider this army itself in its historical development in the last seventy years, its present form, its materiel, its internal service organisation, its tactical training and its characteristic forms of combat. This is the purpose of the present lines.

The English army is especially interesting to the military observer. It is the only one in the world that still keeps unbendingly to the old line tactics, at least in so far as it has never known columns within the range of infantry fire (except for actions in defiles). Not only does it fire in line, its bayonet attacks, too, are made only in line. Nonetheless—or perhaps precisely for that reason — it is undeniably the army that has suffered fewest defeats. In any event, it is worthwhile taking a closer look at the battle methods of such an army, particularly now, when, to the astonishment of the whole world, what was believed to be impossible has become possible: that England threatens to make war on us Germans.

I

We begin with the infantry, naturally. The robur peditum is the chief strength and the pride of the English army. Ever since William Napier it has been an article of faith for all England that the massed fire of an English line is superior to that of any other troops, and that the British bayonet is irresistible, and true it is that the English, like other people, to be sure, owe their victories above all to their infantry.

The English infantry has 3 Guards regiments with 7 battalions, 109 line regiments, of which Nos. 1 to 25 have two battalions, No. 60 (Rifles) 4 battalions, and the remainder only one battalion each. In addition, there is the Rifle Brigade with 4 battalions, making a total of 141 battalions. Whether there are one or two battalions in a line regiment is determined exclusively by requirements; as soon as circumstances permit, the second battalions of the first 25 regiments will certainly be disbanded again. The promotion of the officers likewise takes place in the regiment, which often gives rise to absurd disarrangements, e.g. when, as at present, the first battalion of the 13th Regiment is stationed in Jamaica and the second in New Zealand.

The reserve and elite troops are primarily the Guards and the eight Highland regiments, who have always honoured their reputation. Nine so-called "light" and 5 "fusilier" regiments count as light infantry, but differ in only a few respects from the [regiments of the] line, and only 8 rifle battalions are true light infantry. Regiments Nos. 101 to 109, formerly European regiments of the East India Company, serve only in India.

Apart from these 141 battalions of British infantry, there are also various corps in the home country, to which we shall return later, and in the colonies:

In North America: 1 battalion and 2 companies of

British troops............................................................................................ 1,350 men

In the West Indies: 4 battalions of Negroes and

mulattoes........................................................................................................ 3,700 "

In St. Helena: 1 British battalion....................................................................... 560 "

In Malta: native fortress artillery....................................................................... 640 "

At the Cape of Good Hope: mounted rifles, 5/6

Hottentots, 1/6 Europeans, mainly Germans and

Swiss................................................................................................................... 900 "

In Ceylon: 3 battalions of native rifles............................................................ 1,460 "

.....................................................................................................................8,610 men

Finally, the native army in India, 151 battalions with a total of 110,000 men. With few exceptions, these troops are commanded by British officers and their entire organisation is very similar to the English line. But the Indian army still retains many characteristics from the time of the East India Company; e.g., commissions cannot be bought there, at least not officially, although similar things are done indirectly there, too.

On February 5 of this year there were 58 battalions of English infantry in India, 3 in China, 2 in Mauritius (Isle-de-France), 4 at the Cape, 12 in Canada and the other North American possessions, 1 in Bermuda, 2 in the West Indies, 10 in New Zealand (because of the war with the natives), 5 in Gibraltar, 4 in the Ionian islands, 5 in Malta, 42 in England and on the way home. Of the latter, there were 6 in London, 9 in the Aldershot camp,10 in Portsmouth, Plymouth and Dover, 1 in Jersey, 2 in inland England, 2 in Scotland, 10 in Ireland, 2 on the way back home. We see from this what strong support the navy gives the army; without its protection and the rapid means of transportation it affords, these weak garrisons would be far from adequate. Where the navy can provide only slight protection, however, as in India and Canada, we find strong garrisons, and likewise so in the strategic positions in the Mediterranean, where it is necessary to be prepared for conflicts with European troops.

It was formerly the rule to send the Guards out of the country only in case of war; but there are now two battalions in Canada. The total strength of the infantry on active service at the present time comes to 133,500 men; this averages 884 men per battalion, divided into 10 companies, each with a captain, a lieutenant, and an ensign (equivalent to our second lieutenant).

In addition, each battalion, with the exception of the Guards, has two depot companies for training recruits; 6 to 8 of these depots are combined into a depot battalion, of which there are 23, with a total strength of about 18,000 men. These depots are all in the home country, usually by or near the sea. Thus, the total strength of the English infantry is something over 150,000 men.

II

The officers are recruited from all the educated classes of the nation. Not much theoretical schooling is demanded of the aspirants; the prescribed examinations pose questions that would make a Prussian ensign smile. However, increasing efforts are being made to get young men from the military school at Sandhurst into the army, in particular by giving commissions as ensigns without purchase to those who come out top in the examinations. Not much is required by way of foreign languages, and the aspirant has great freedom of choice among a number of European and Indian languages; the mathematical requirements are extremely low; on the other hand, much more emphasis is laid on good, clear, simple expression in practical English composition than among us, where almost every German army writes its own kind of German, and not always good common sense German at that. In a country where the two principal parties are almost equally represented in the aristocracy, it goes without saying that no inquiry is made into political opinions; the greatest military family in England, the Napiers, consisted and consists almost entirely of Radicals. In general more stress is laid on manly character than on knowledge, and since the English officer can be certain that he will be sent to all corners of the world and will soon come under fire, it stands to reason that the English army cannot be, to the extent that many others can, an almshouse for people who are lacking in almost every physical and moral quality required in a soldier. This last, however, is the best guarantee of a good officer corps; for despite all the fine rules mentioned above, nowhere is there more nepotism and family influence than in the English army. No one can get into the officer corps without influential connections, and no one gets promotion without money, unless he has the good fortune to have the man ahead of him killed in action. Here, too, there are honourable exceptions, of course; a certain shoemaker's son from- Glasgow died last year as Field Marshal Lord Clyde, after he had reconquered the India that had been lost; but poor Colin Campbell, to get that far, had to take part as an officer in the campaign against Buenos Aires as early as 1807, and in 1854, when he went to the Crimea, he was only a colonel. And without a distant relative, who commanded a regiment, he would never have become an officer.

English officers form a very exclusive corps, especially in England itself. They even have a dialect or rather an accent of their own, as in Prussia, and have very little contact with the citizens of their garrison town. This isolation is enhanced by the circumstance that the tinmarried officers live in barracks (or rather a separate building in the barracks compound) and have to eat at the officers' mess. In a country where the army is under civilian jurisdiction for all offences that are not of a strictly military nature, this living together in barracks is a necessity. Young officers are punished severely for pranks in town that could bring them into conflict with the civilian authorities; as compensation, they have fairly broad freedom in the barracks themselves. Female visitors of all sorts come and go, there is heavy drinking and gambling, and the young gentlemen play the heartiest practical jokes on one another. If a sneak gets in among them, so much the worse for him. A few years ago these practical jokes, carried to excess in some regiments, led to scandalous courts martial, and since then strict orders prohibiting them have been issued; actually, however, this sort of amusement is regarded with indulgence, so long as public scandal is avoided. The government contributes 25 pounds sterling per annum per company to the officers' mess, which should be decent but economical and never place officers with limited means in a position where they are compelled to spend more money than they can afford. Nonetheless, there are occasions enough to lay out money, and the usurers ruin as many young officers with bills and I.O.U.s as elsewhere.

This way of life leaves its mark on the outward demeanor of the English officer. With civilians—although when off duty he almost always wears civilian clothes—he is usually dignified and reserved; arrogant overbearing behaviour towards the citizens occurs as exceptions in such garrison cities as Portsmouth, or in marksmanship schools, where many officers are together and set the tone. In general, the officer has to show that he is "an officer and a gentleman"; at any time he can be called up before a court martial, discharged and even cashiered "for conduct unbecoming an officer and a gentleman", and no mercy is shown if an officer has caused a scandal by his behaviour in public, unless, of course, he resigns first. Cover-ups of scandalous public incidents, such as we know have occurred in Germany, are impossible in England, and the spirit of the army can only gain from that.

The officers' right to wear civilian clothing off duty, unusual as it may seem to us Germans, has its excellent aspects, and England provides abundant proof that it has not the slightest ill effects on the military spirit of the officers. It should be noted, into the bargain, that in the main garrison towns, such as Chatham, Portsmouth, etc., where there is a good deal of military activity, the officers wear civilian clothing less frequently.

The duel has disappeared entirely from the English army. The last duel involving officers took place twenty years ago between two brothers-in-law, a major and a lieutenant; the major was killed, and the lieutenant was acquitted by the jury because of the shocking provocation leading up to the affair. The ideas of honour that have been implanted in the English officer corps— and by no one more energetically than Wellington himself—are based on the fundamental principle that anyone who insults another without cause dishonours himself, not the person he has insulted; and that he can only restore his honour by making amends for his injustice so far as he is able. Anyone who is the first to insult a comrade is therefore liable to the charge of conduct unbecoming a gentleman, unless he makes amends, or if the insult is of such a nature that it cannot be amended, a court martial soon settles the matter. This way of thinking may seem strange enough in some circles, particularly the Prussian army, but it certainly has more common sense on its side than the fantastically exaggerated duel point d'honneur of some people.

That this is thoroughly consistent with the feeling of military honour is proved by the English officers themselves, who need fear no comparison in this respect.

Advancement in the regiment is exclusively by seniority, coupled with purchase of rank, as follows: As soon as a vacancy occurs, the senior officer of the next lower rank has the choice of whether he will purchase the place or not; if he turns it down, which happens only because of lack of money, the choice goes to the next in seniority, and so forth. This purchase of commissions is without a doubt one of the worst institutions in the English army, something foreign soldiers will never reconcile themselves to. It is absurd and reprehensible, even if one allows all the mitigations that the English plead in its defence: that it enables younger officers to reach higher places more quickly, that it is an old-established custom, one hard to eradicate, etc. It is and remains a shame to the English army that it has not been able to supersede this system, and it undoubtedly does the greatest harm to the spirit of the officer corps that able officers must grow rusty in lower ranks because they have only their pay and no capital.

The price of a commission as ensign (i.e. second lieutenant) is 450 pounds sterling (3,000 thalers) in the line infantry; if the ensign wants to advance to lieutenant, he must pay a further 250 pounds (1,700 thalers); for the captain's commission, 1,100 pounds more (7,030 thalers); major's commission, 1,400 pounds more (9,030 thalers); lieutenant colonel's commission, a further 1,300 pounds (8,700 thalers). This commission is thus worth a grand total of 4,500 pounds sterling, or over 30,000 thalers, which the owner gets back from his successor when he advances to colonel. In the Guards and the cavalry the prices are still higher; there is no purchase of commissions in the artillery and the engineers. If the officer dies, all the capital invested is lost, and the next in seniority takes his place without purchase. From colonel on, purchase no longer applies; every lieutenant colonel.who has been on active service in that rank for 3 years, becomes a colonel by right. It is forbidden, under penalty of being cashiered, to pay more than the set price for a position as officer, but this happens very often.

Since the requirements for the ensign's examination do not comprise any military knowledge, a special examination is set before advancing to lieutenant and captain, which is limited to practical service, service regulations, military law and drill. Theoretical attainments in tactics are not required.

The officers in the Guards have higher rank: the ensign that of the lieutenant, the lieutenant that of the captain, the captain that of the lieutenant colonel. This causes a great deal of resentment in the line.

Advancement of non-commissioned officers to officer rank occurs only in exceptional cases. In every battalion the bulk of the routine work falls on three officers: the adjutant, the quartermaster, and the paymaster. Old dependable non-commissioned officers are frequently appointed to these posts, but they never get beyond the rank of lieutenant, which is granted them gratis. Otherwise, promotion to officer rank takes place rarely, for exceptional distinction in the face of the enemy. The nature of the English recruited army, which produces a very strong admixture of low and rough elements, the resulting tone prevailing among the troops and the discipline consequently required, makes it necessary for the officers to belong to a higher class of society than the soldiers, as a matter of course. Accordingly, the distance between officer and soldier is greater in England than anywhere else. And, likewise, advancement upward from the ranks is made very difficult and will always remain a rare exception so long as the purchase of commissions, on the one hand, and the recruitment system, on the other, continue. For educated young men to enlist in the army as volunteers, to serve with the prospect of advancement, as so often happens in Prussia and France, is something that cannot occur in England; the nature of the troops is such that it would be generally believed that the young man took to the soldier's trade for quite different motives, about which he would prefer to remain silent. This makes it quite understandable that the English officer corps consists almost entirely of men who have been brought up as gentlemen, and that the mass of soldiers has more respect for officers who are from the outset their "natural superiors", as the saying goes in England. Correspondingly, the tone prevailing between officers and soldiers is cold and businesslike. The two classes are linked only by the bond of command and obedience. There are neither intimacies and jokes nor outbreaks of passion. Praise and blame are seldom communicated directly to the soldiers by the officers, and then only in the same calm businesslike voice. Naturally, this applies only to the official relationships in drilling, etc.; in private English officers can curse ... as to which their lads have plenty to say.

One very peculiar institution in the English army is that an officer can have a double rank: a lower one in his regiment and a higher one in the army. This second rank, when it is conferred permanently and unconditionally, is known as brevet rank. Thus, a captain may be a brevet major or a brevet lieutenant colonel in the army; there have even been cases (especially with commanders of Indian irregular troops) where they have been only lieutenants in their regiments but were majors in the army. Such a captain and brevet major performs the duties of a captain in his regiment, but counts as a staff officer for service in the garrison or camp. This higher rank can also be conferred for only a certain time or for a given colony or theatre of war. Thus, in the last ten years many colonels were named "brigadier generals" or even "major generals" for the duration of the Crimean War or of their stay in the Levant, and similarly in India. This system provides a way of promoting specially favoured or specially useful men to higher positions despite seniority; it is obvious, however, that it entails many unpleasantnesses and much confusion. In the Crimea, the English could never make it comprehensible to the French that a man can be a captain and a major at the same time.

One of the rules for promotion is that no one can become captain who has not had two years of full service as an ensign and lieutenant, nor can any one become a major who has not been an officer for six years.

The military training of officers who do not come from the Sandhurst school is conducted in platoon and company drill, just like that of the soldiers; it is only after examination before the battalion commander that they are released from drill and admitted to serve as officers. All the subaltern officers of a battalion are brought together into a unit under the command of a staff officer once a year before the spring training course of the battalion, and in this form, with rifle on shoulder, they go through the complete individual, platoon and company drill. No doubt this is usually done very superficially.

III

As we know, the numbers of non-commissioned officers and privates are replenished by enlistment, and exclusively in Great Britain and Ireland. Only the 100th Regiment is recruited in Canada. The recruiting is under the adjutant general of the army and is conducted in two ways: In the first place, the individual regiments and depot battalions can take enlistments in their own garrisons. Secondly, apart from this, there is an organised recruiting service throughout the country, which is divided into nine recruiting districts for the purpose (England 4, Scotland 2, Ireland 3). Each district is under a supervisory staff officer (usually a brevet colonel) and, where necessary, is subdivided into smaller regions under lieutenants or captains.—All in all, the following are employed in this service: 8 staff officers, 9 adjutants, 9 paymasters, 9 physicians, 11 recruiting subaltern officers (on half-pay), 8 sergeant-majors, 48 sergeants and an appropriate number of privates. In addition to this, the Guards also recruit, exclusively to boost their own ranks. Every recruit has the right to choose the corps he wants to join. The pious wish is expressed that every corps be recruited as far as possible in the county whose name it bears. Foreigners are to be taken in only with special permission, for which reason they are often passed through as "Scots".

In wartime the militia must serve primarily as a seedbed for the line; for a certain number of men passing over into the line from the militia (the number being set on each occasion) one officer of the militia regiment involved receives a commission in the line.

During the Indian Mutiny in 1857 the authorities went so far as to give a commission as lieutenant colonel to every serving or retired staff officer who brought in 1,000 recruits.

Every recruit or re-enlisted soldier receives his full equipment gratis and a bounty varying with the need for recruits but never less than 1 pound and very seldom more than 10 pounds sterling (67 thalers). It is often different for different arms; the largest amount is paid for engineers, since only the best men can be used there. The bounty is paid in part at the time of certification, but most of it is paid upon entering the regiment and after the recruit has been received by the commander of the regiment. This certification consists in having the recruit brought before the police magistrate not earlier than 24 hours after the recruitment and his stating under oath that he enlisted voluntarily and that there are no legal obstacles to his joining the army.

For the cavalry, artillery drivers, engineers, service corps, and the infantry stationed in India, China, Australia and St. Helena, recruits are accepted between the ages of 18 and 25; for the rest of the artillery and infantry, from 17 to 25. The height is set as follows:

Cavalry: cuirassier Guards: 5' 10" to 6'

heavy dragoon regiments: 5' 8" to 5' 11"

medium dragoons and lancers: 5' 7" to 5' 9"

hussars: 5' 6" to 5' 8"

Artillery: cannoneers: minimum 5' 7", if under 18 years

of age, 5' 6"

drivers: 5' 4" to 5' 6"

mechanics: minimum 5' 6"

Infantry: minimum

Guards: 5' 8/2"

line 5' 6"

But this minimum varies greatly; any serious danger of war compels the government to lower it at once, and even the circumstance that the reduction of the length of service from 12 to 10 years will release very many soldiers in the near future was enough to induce the government a few weeks ago to reduce the minimum for the infantry to 5' 5". In general, here as elsewhere the measurements are increasingly being reduced, although, as might be expected, taller soldiers can always be obtained on average with a recruited army than with universal military service or conscription. It will be seen from the above figures that this applies in England, too; the figures can easily be converted to Rhenish measurements with sufficient accuracy if we deduct 2 1/4 inches from 5' to 5' 6", and 2 1/2" from 5' 7" to 6'.

In addition to the height, a minimum chest circumference is also set: from 5' 6" to 5' 8", 33 inches; [5'] 8" to [5'] 10", 34 inches; over 5' 10", 35 inches. Driver cannoneers, service corps soldiers and marksmen must always have 34" chest measurement. However, driver cannoneers will be accepted even if they do not fully meet these standards, provided that they are experienced in handling horses.

Boys of at least 14 are enlisted as drummers and buglers with the permission of their parents. They receive no enlistment bounty.

The length of service is 10 years for the infantry, 12 for the cavalry, artillery, engineers and service corps; at the end of the period the soldier can re-enlist for 11 years more in the infantry and 9 years in the other branches, if he is found to be still fit. At the end of this re-enlistment he can continue in the service on three months' notice. If the unit is abroad when the enlistment period expires, the officer commanding the station has the right to extend it up to two years.

Every soldier with good conduct is, as a rule, permitted to buy himself out. The redemption amount is based on the time of service already rendered and the time remaining, on the conduct, etc., and is a maximum of 30 pounds in the cavalry, 20 pounds in the infantry, and for coloured soldiers in the colonial corps 12 pounds.

After 21 years of service every soldier is entitled to a pension. The amount of the pension is based on the length of service, his conduct and the physical infirmities incurred during service; for privates and non-commissioned officers it is at least 8 pence (6 Sgr. 8 Pf.) and at most 3 shillings 6 pence (1 thaler 5 Sgr.) per diem. Under certain circumstances, pensions are granted for shorter service, too.

The recruiting sergeants, with the soldiers assigned to them, usually stay in the worst districts of the big cities and keep their eyes chiefly on the public houses. They often parade through the streets with bands on their caps, to the accompaniment of some drummers and pipers, attract a crowd and try to fish in it. If the prey they are looking for is there, he is enticed into a pub as soon as possible and every kind of trick is put into play to get the victim to accept the symbolic shilling, which seals the contract. Once the new candidate for glory has taken the shilling, he can free himself by paying "smart-money" of a pound sterling before a police magistrate. The law requires that the budding hero must declare before the magistrate, at least 24 hours later, that he is enlisting voluntarily and is firm in his decision. The assumption of the law, and quite a correct one, is that the recruit is not sober, as a rule, when he takes the shilling, and the purpose is to give him a chance to sober up. But it would have to be a poor sort of recruiting sergeant that would let his prey get away from him so easily. He and his men do not let the recruit out of their sight, and before he comes before the magistrate, spirits and beer have had a chance to do their work. The best of it is that a large part of the reckoning is usually paid by the recruit himself, the sergeant advancing the money freely against the bounty. Given these circumstances, it is naive, but prudent, for the regulations to say expressly: Only unmarried soldiers and drummers should be selected for recruiting duty, and only in cases of extreme necessity married sergeants, but in any case only healthy, vigorous men. Anyone who is not a good drinker is unsuited to this duty.

One has the feeling of having been taken back quite into the eighteenth century when one sees this sort of recruiting. Despite the formal safeguards with which the law has surrounded this practice, it remains a fact that by far the largest part of the "English army entirely made up of volunteers" enters into that institution most unwillingly; whether for their own eventual good on the whole, is another question.

It is clear enough what sections of the nation come into the army in this manner. To a large extent, the army, like our recruited armies of former days, remains a refugium peccatorum, in which the larger and better part of all the adventurous elements of the people are brought together and are restrained by an exacting course of training and very strict discipline. As a result, the English army, so far as its moral and intellectual character is concerned, is far below all those that are formed by conscription (even with substitution) or by universal military service without substitution. Only the French Foreign Legion and those other French corps formed chiefly from substitutes, such as the Zouaves, can be put on anything like a par with it; although it cannot be denied that the entire French army, by the increasing preference shown for the career soldier in the rank and file, is coming closer and closer to the character of the English army. But even the French remplaçant is far better educated and has better manners than the rough, wild lads from the dregs of the big cities who set the tone in English barracks. An educated young man can still enter the French army as a volunteer to serve for advancement, without the training time as common soldier being too intolerable for him; in England, a man would have to be out of his mind to do that. As proud as the Englishman is of his army as a whole, he is equally contemptuous of the individual common soldier; even in the lower orders of society it is still rather discreditable to be enlisted or to have a soldier as a relative. In general, the quality of the recruits has undoubtedly improved a great deal in the last ten years. An effort is made to get as much information as possible on the antecedents of the recruits and steer clear of definitely bad characters. The heavy enlistments that were made necessary by the Crimean War and the Indian Mutiny soon exhausted the degenerate class from which the army had filled its ranks as a rule during the long period of peace. Not only had the height requirements to be reduced (down to 5' 3" for the infantry at one point), but the soldier's life had to be made more attractive and steps had to be taken to improve the tone in the barracks, so that the more reliable members of the working class could also be drawn into the sphere of recruitment. An additional factor was the shortage of suitable candidates for the many new positions as non-commissioned officers (in the Crimean War the battalions were raised to almost double strength). It was also realised that warfare like Wellington's in Spain, with the inevitable looting of all the captured fortresses, is no longer suitable in the Europe of today. The press took up the cause of the soldiers, and it soon became the rule among senior officers to extend philanthropy to the troops. Steps were taken to make life more agreeable for the soldiers, to provide them with facilities for recreation and activities in the barracks or camp, and to keep them away from the pubs. Thus, especially in the last seven years and for the most part by private subscription, libraries, reading rooms, clubrooms with all kinds of games, soldiers' clubs, etc., have been set up. In the camps some land has been assigned to the soldiers for gardens, where possible, as the French do; experiments have been made with theatrical performances and lectures; and from time to time exhibitions have been arranged of various small pieces of art works, etc., that they have produced. All these things are still in their infancy but are becoming more and more general. They are extremely necessary. During the campaigns in the Crimea and in India the recruits were undoubtedly of a much higher level than previously, since both wars were very popular among the masses of people. The tone of the army has improved considerably. Contact with the French soldiers in the Crimea also played a part. The job now is to keep that spirit up, so that even during a long period of peace it will be possible to obtain recruits of a similar high level and not be limited again exclusively to the disorderly elements of the population which are always the first to apply in peacetime.

These last, nonetheless, still constitute the larger part of the army, and all the arrangements are made accordingly. An English barracks with its auxiliary buildings and courtyard is surrounded by high walls on all sides, usually with only one gate. There is a separate building for the officers' quarters, and one or more for the soldiers. Where the soldiers' quarters have windows on the street, this part of the building is usually secured, in recent installations, by a deep ditch with a strong iron fence along its outer edge. In large cities, especially in the case of militia barracks, which include an armoury (the militia is called into service for only 4 weeks in the year), the entire street front of the building has loopholes instead of windows, and the corners of the wings are provided with turrets for flanking fire—proof that uprisings of workers are not considered as so unlikely. The soldier spends his life in this huge barracks prison, with the exception of his time off. The admission of civilians is strictly supervised and the entire structure is carefully guarded against view from the outside, so that the soldier may be kept under maximum control and separated from civilians. Here there is none of the easy association between citizens and soldiers that is so common in Germany, or ease of entry into the barracks for all people, and to ensure that no lasting relationships are formed, the garrisons are shifted every year, as a rule.

The most common disciplinary offences can be readily inferred from the character of the army. They are drunkenness, absence without leave after roll-call, theft from comrades, fighting, insubordination and actual acts of violence against a superior. Minor offences are punished summarily by the battalion commander. He has the exclusive power of punishment but can delegate the power to company commanders, up to three days detention in barracks. His own power of punishment extends to: 1) imprisonment up to 7 days, with or without solitary confinement, with or without hard labour; soldiers given this sentence have the right to appeal from the battalion commander to a court martial:

2) imprisonment in a dark cell (black-hole ) for up to 48 hours;

3) detention in barracks for up to a month, during which the prisoner must perform all his service and in addition any extra work imposed on him by the commander; confinement to barracks also entails punitive drill with full pack for up to 14 days; the punitive drill must not last for more than an hour at a time but may be repeated up to four times daily. In cases 2) and 3) the commander may grant an appeal to a court martial. Solitary confinement or the black-hole are to be reserved, so far as possible, for cases of drunkenness, brawling and insolence towards superiors, and in serious cases may be combined with confinement to barracks, but in such a way that the entire period of arrest does not exceed one month.

As we can see, an English battalion commander has means enough at his disposal to keep order among his wild young fellows. If these means do not suffice, a court martial provides the remedy, the rebellious fellow getting the cat-o'-nine-tails as a last resort. This is one of the most barbarous instruments of punishment that exists: a short-handled whip with nine long, hard, knotted thongs. The offender, stripped to the waist, is tied to a three-cornered frame and the strokes are delivered with the utmost force. Even the first stroke breaks the skin and draws blood. After a few strokes the whip and the flogger are changed in order not lo let up on the delinquent. The doctor is of course always present. Fifty strokes of this kind always make a long recovery in hospital necessary. And yet there are often men who endure these fifty strokes without a cry of pain, since it counts as more shameful to show pain than to earn the strokes.

Twelve years ago the cat was still used very frequently, and up to 150 strokes were ordered. If I am not mistaken, the regimental commander could hand out a certain number of strokes summarily until that time. Then the number was limited to 50 strokes and the power to order them given exclusively to courts martial. Finally, after the Crimean War, and particularly at the urging of Prince Albert, the Prussian division of the soldiers into two classes was introduced and it was decided that only soldiers who had already been put into the second class for previous offences and had not got back into the first class by virtue of a year of faultless service could be given corporal punishment for a fresh offence. This distinction does not apply in the face of the enemy; there any common soldier is subject to flogging. In 1862, 126 men were flogged in the army, 114 of them being given the highest legal number of 50 strokes.

In general, it will be seen that both the need and the desire to use the whip have greatly declined, and since the same causes are still operative in the army, it is to be presumed that this will continue to be the case and that the cat will be used increasingly as an exceptional, extreme method of deterrence, reserved for the worst cases in the face of the enemy. For it has been realised that appeals to the soldiers' feeling of honour are more effective than degrading punishments, and on that subject the entire English army says with one voice that a flogged soldier is never worth anything after that. Nonetheless, complete abolition of the cat will not come so soon in England. We all know how strong the prejudices in favour of corporal punishment have been and, to some extent, still are, even in armies that are made up of much better elements of society than the English; and in a recruited army such an extreme instrument of terror is still more excusable than elsewhere. However, the English are certainly right in holding that, if there is to be corporal punishment, it should be used only as a last resort, but in that case very severely. The eternal mild canings that are still given in many armies, including German armies, unfortunately, and which can only have the effect of weakening the fear of that punishment...