COMMENDED ESSAY, 1898. 
345 
undoubted difficulty in keeping count of the ammunition expended. 
This will throw a very heavy responsibility on those in charge of the 
ammunition supply. It is quite unnecessary to enlarge on the very 
serious results of a battery advancing, say, to decisive ranges in support 
of the infantry attack with an insufficient supply of ammunition. 
Alleged Disadvantages. 
It has been urged that the introduction of the Q.F. system will 
necessitate the provision of more ammunition vehicles than is the case 
at present; and, as far as I can gather, the reasons on which this state¬ 
ment is based are broadly as follows :— 
1. That Field Artillery, with the more extended role assigned to it, 
will, whether of the existing type or quick-firing, expend more ammu¬ 
nition than formerly. 
2. That a Q.F. battery requires a greater supply of ammunition than 
one of the existing type, in order not only to meet the demands of 
rapid fire but to cover inevitable waste. 
This is a most serious allegation and deserves the closest examination. 
Irrespective of expense—always an important consideration—any in¬ 
crease in the difficulties of ammunition supply touches a vital point in 
the conduct of Artillery in the field. 
Taking the first of the reasons above mentioned, what is meant pre¬ 
cisely by the word “formerly” ? I assume that the war of 1870-1 is 
referred to, since that is the only war, since the introduction of rifled 
guns, in which the Artillery of at any rate one of the combatants played 
the part which it is asserted it is to repeat and more than repeat in the 
future. 
Now the latter prediction, or at any rate the first half of it, is very 
possibly true ; but nevertheless I cannot help thinking that deducing 
an extra expenditure of ammunition as its corollary is sometimes due 
to a confusion of thought, for when drawing inferences as to ammuni¬ 
tion expenditure from this war, it is sometimes forgotten that the only 
projectile (case shot excepted) successfully used was the common shell 
fuzed with percussion fuze, employed by the Germans. The Bavarians 
and French used shrapnel shell with very disappointing results, owing 
to indifferent time fuzes and other causes. 
Now it cannot I think be denied that a modern shrapnel shell when 
controlled by an accurate time fuze is, as a man-killing projectile, vastly 
superior to the common shell used in 1870-1. Allowing for the un¬ 
doubted difficulties in getting from it the maximum results of which 
it is theoretically capable, I believe I shall rather under than over-rate 
its powers when I reckon that the effect of a given number of modern 
shrapnel shell should be at least double that of a similar number of 
common shell of the date referred to, assuming equal skill in the em¬ 
ployment of both and such targets as would be ordinarily met with. 
If I am correct in my estimate, then clearly with similar opportunities 
only half the ammunition should now be used to attain the same results 
as were obtained by the Germans in 1870-1. 
Before, therefore, the prediction that more ammunition will be ex¬ 
pended in the battles of the future than of the past can be accepted as 
a certainty, it must be conclusively proved that Artillery in future will 
have double the opportunities of coming into action with reasonable 
hope of success which it had in 1870-1. 
