THE ROYAL ARTILLERY INSTITUTION. 
265 
ROUGH NOTES 
ON THE 
HISTORY OF FIELD ARTILLERY. 
BY LIEUT. H. W. HIME, II.A. 
Field Artillery, applying this term to a confused mass of military 
machines, seems to have first come into general use in Flanders, the 
ballistse being gradually replaced by 1-prs. and 2-prs. which were carried 
by twos or fours in carts. In L382, 5000 men of Ghent formed themselves 
into a dense mass surrounded by 200 small cannon, and succeeded in driving 
off 40,000 men of Bruges. 
What the guns at this early period must have been may be imagined when 
one learns that a century later, during the invasion of Italy by Charles VIII. 
so unwieldy were the guns that the besieged had time to repair the damage 
done by one shot before the next could be fired. 1 2 
Perhaps the earliest mention of anything like a manoeuvre of artillery on 
the field of battle may be found in the account of the battle of Aubin du 
Cormier, 1488, where the French guns were brought to bear on the flank of 
the English and Germans, and did some execution. 
In the time of Henri II. of France, 3 artillery carriages were still in so bad 
a state, that when it was desired to advance the guns when in u action,” the 
movement was performed by hooking the horses to the front of the cheeks 
of the carriage, in order to avoid limbering up or reversing. 3 
The guns were at this time as clumsy as the carriages, the bastard which 
threw a ball of 7 lbs. weighing 22 cwt. Indeed, it is impossible to avoid 
concluding that the destructive power of the artillery at this period was 
exceedingly small, and that its usefulness depended almost entirely on its 
1 Fave. “ Histoire et Taetique des Trois Armes,” p. 23. 
2 The above statements are taken from an anonymous article on “ Gun Carriages ” in an old 
number of Colburn’s “ United Service Magazine.” 
3 The prolonge is said to have been invented by Machiavelli, cir. 1500. 
