THE ROYAL ARTILLERY INSTITUTION. 
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to convince those in power of the necessity of introducing into the English 
service the improvements that had been adopted on the continent. But 
far from being able to accomplish the positive good of forcing these improve¬ 
ments into the service, their combined influence was not strong enough to 
effect the negative good of keeping out of the service some extravagant and silly 
inventions that were made about this time. Thus it happened that in 1774, 
one Colonel Weidemann, a German, abetted by the Duke of Cumberland, 
succeeded in foisting upon the country a number of 6-prs. of 2*5 cwt., “ con¬ 
structed of pieces of copper rolled up and soldered together/’ * 1 
Cut off from the continent by a silver streak of sea,” the English military 
authorities slumbered and slept until they were rudely awakened from their 
dreams by the thunder of the Erench Revolution, and then fear wrung from 
them concessions which neither the dictates of common sense nor the 
entreaties of their artillery officers could induce them to yield. The first low 
mutterings of the storm that was brooding over France became unmistakeably 
audible in 1788, and the Master-General of Ordnance, the Duke of Richmond, 
sent instructions in that year to Woolwich to equip a number of field guns 
which would be “capable of accompanying cavalry” in the field. 2 To obtain 
this object the Duke considered it would be necessary to mount the gunners on 
horseback; but the artillery officers, like their brethren in Austria some years 
before, objected to the detachment system. The Woolwich Committee 3 fully 
appreciated the advantages of constructing a field artillery possessed of great 
mobility. They objected, not to the end proposed by the Duke, but to the 
means he suggested of gaining that end, and they pointed out with con¬ 
siderable acuteness the vulnerable points of the detachment system. “ Royal 
howitzers, or long 3-pus. upon new-pattern carriages,” 4 says Major Adye, 
in his account of the proceedings of the Committee, “can make rapid 
movements at a much less expense than such pieces as require the 
artillerymen to be mounted on saddle-horses. As, for instance, the new- 
pattern carriages allow four men and fifty-six rounds of ammunition to be 
carried upon the gun-carriage and its limber, which can be drawn by four 
near five miles to enable them to share in the battle, yet Phillips, who was attached to the cavalry, 
“ made so much expedition with his cannon as to have an opportunity, by a severe cannonade, to 
oblige the enemy—who had passed the Dymel and were formed on the other side—to retire with 
the utmost precipitation.”—“ Gentleman’s Mag.,” Vol. XXX. p. 387. “ Capt. Phillips,” says an 
eye-witness, “ brought up the English artillery at a gallop, and seconded the attack of the cavalry 
in a surprising manner.”—“ Operations of the Allied Army, 1757 to 1762, under H.S.H. Prince 
Ferdinand,” by an officer of the British forces, London, 1764. Phillips’ conduct on this occasion has 
drawn forth the eulogies of even a French writer, the Marquis de Ternay.—“ Traite de Tact.” Tom. I. 
p. 601. For Phillips’ services in America, see “Proceedings R.A. Institution,” Yol. IV. p. 248. 
1 Muller’s “ Treatise on Artillery,” Introd. p. 4. Speaking of the righteous resistance made 
by the Royal Artillery to the introduction of these guns into the service, this writer impudently 
remarks:—“It was not without great difficulty that they were received, and no less than the 
express command of H.R.H. the late Duke of Cumberland could have prevailed over the servile 
attachment for an old-established custom, though ever so erroneous, which, when once covered 
by the veil of time, becomes in a manner sacred.”- As may be guessed from the turn of the phrase 
about the Duke of Cumberland, Mr. Muller held a subordinate office in H.R.H.’s household. The 
Duke would have done well to leave artillery questions to be settled by those who understood 
them. 
2 MS. Notes, by Major S. P. Adye, R.A., in the Library of the R.A. Institution, Woolwich. 
3 Colonel D. Drummond, Major W. Congreve, and Major T. Blomefield. 
4 In this system of carriages, two gunners sat upon the limber-boxes, and two gunners upon 
seats on the gun axle-tree boxes. 
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