SILVER MEDAL PRIZE ESSAY, 1894 . 
367 
of instruction must now be referred to. The varied conditions under 
which batteries of artillery are serving during peace in all quarters of 
the Empire make it impossible to lay down a general system of training 
which can be applicable to all cases. Aldershot, however, may be taken 
as the normal school of tactical instruction, the system which is now in 
process of development there being applied as far as possible in other 
places. The winter months are given up to individual battery in¬ 
struction, theoretical study, and preparation for the practical out-door 
training. At the beginning of the drill season each battery in turn is 
placed at the disposal of its Commanding Officer, for a course of instruc¬ 
tion lasting 14 days. 1 * When all the batteries of the Brigade Division 
have completed this course they are trained as a whole brigade unit, 
under the Lieut.-Colonel, for a further period of a fortnight. 3 If this 
training is carefully thought out beforehand, and the most made of the 
time available, it is long enough for all necessary purposes. The Bri¬ 
gade Division then goes to the practice ground, where the training of 
the batteries, both individually and collectively, is tested under service 
conditions. After return from practice, or possibly before it, according 
to the dates fixed, the work of the Brigade Division Commander should 
be tested by the Artillery Commander—one or more Brigade Divisions 
being practised together against a marked enemy, and at other times 
manoeuvring as opposing forces. Practice in this higher regimental 
training of massed batteries is essential before combined manoeuvres of 
all arms are attempted. The value of these tactical exercises, however, 
depends on the care with which the schemes are worked out by those 
who are charged with setting them, upon the umpired knowledge of 
the ground selected, and upon the merits of his subsequent criticism. 3 
The above arrangements ensure a gradually progressive system of 
training being carried on throughout the year, beginning with the in¬ 
dividual battery, continued with the Brigade Division, and subsequently 
when feasible with massed Brigade Divisions, and so working up to the 
crowning test of combined manuoeuvres of all arms. The essential 
features of this system are method, regularity and patience—each leader 
being given full opportunity for training those under his command by 
his own methods, and then being subjected in his turn to being trained 
himself by the next superior leader above him. The problem always to 
be solved is how to delegate executive responsibility, and at the same 
time maintain the necessary control of the single will. This is a car- 
1 “ Field Artillery Drill,” p. 284. 
*Ihid, p. 286 . 
3 The writer has before him some remarks made by General Sir Evelyn Wood, V.C., G.C.B., 
G.C.M.G., during the conference after one of his artillery tactical days in 1891. The remarks are 
so pertinent to the views put forward in the above paragraph that he ventures to reproduce them 
here. 
“I fear,” said Sir Evelyn Wood, “from the mistakes made to-day that some officers have not 
read the criticism of last Monday’s tactical exercise. I beg Commanding Officers will in future 
make certain that the printed critique of each day’s work is circulated among all their officers. 
The main value of work out of doors is derived from a subsequent study of the mistakes which we 
are all liable to make in the field. I can assure gentlemen, whom I am now addressing, that 
neither my staff nor myself spare any pains to make these days instructive by previous study of 
the ground. I may tell you that I have been three times over the ground on which we are now 
assembled with the particular operation of to-day in view, and I expect to sit up till an early hour 
to-morrow morning compiling my critical remarks of the day’s proceedings.” 
Essential 
features of 
the above 
system of 
training. 
