545 
A PROPOSAL FOR THE 
SUPPLY OP AMMUNITION IN THE 
BY 
MAJOR R. WYNYARD, R.A. 
In offering the following scheme for the consideration of my brother 
officers 1 am fully aware of the probability of there being many serious 
defects in it, and the possibility of some grave error which may render 
it quite impracticable. I am so convinced, however, of the necessity 
for a change in the present system of supply of ammunition that if my 
scheme should only succeed in furnishing some one with an idea which 
should lead to a more satisfactory and less dangerous system than the 
present, I should be well satisfied. 
It is hardly possible for an artillery officer to bring his battery into 
action under the present system of ammunition supply without his 
being struck with a sense of the heavy loss which must be sustained 
by the 'personnel of his battery on the first occasion when it may have 
to encounter the fire of guns similar to those with which it is armed 
and equally well manned. 
The first point which strikes even the ordinary looker-on—and how 
much more those vitally concerned—is the fact that close among the 
guns, and offering a target hardly less visible and of a far more danger¬ 
ous nature than the guns themselves, are placed three large magazines, 
each about three times the size of a gun in action, and each surrounded 
by a crowd of men with exposed cartridges and shell in process of 
transference from the large magazines to smaller ones, which in their 
turn are to discharge their contents (though with considerably less 
risk) at the various guns. 
The next point is the time taken, while the battery is in action and 
probably under fire, in unhooking the horses which have brought up 
these large magazines, in remounting and taking them under cover, 
and the reflection must occur to anyone—what will be the difficulty 
and delay when some of these men and horses are being killed and 
wounded (as must needs be) during the operation, and thereby adding 
to the confusion and hurry which accompany the coming into action of 
the best trained battery when under service conditions ? 
The third point, though this does not force itself upon our notice so 
much at field days or at practice, is the time and trouble involved in 
the replenishment of these magazines when replaced in turn by others, 
and required to be filled up from a third lot, of similar construction 
and similar disadvantages. 
11 . VOL. XX. 
71 
