1.18 
ON THE ATTACK AND DEFENCE OF A POSITION, 
BY 
CAPTAIN E. CLAYTON, R.A. 
The following paper took its origin from a suggestion made to the 
writer that a brief exposition of the principles that have been deduced 
from recent experience for the attack and defence of a position might 
be useful to officers, especially captains, preparing to pass the exami¬ 
nations for promotion prescribed in G.O. 66 of 1st November, 1875. 
The writer has freely consulted the works of the principal modern 
authorities on Tactics, but he is, of course, alone responsible for the 
use he has made of the materials at his disposal. 
An example has been added to show the application of the principles 
enunciated to an actual piece of ground in England, with bodies of 
troops organized as in the English army. It is not put forward as 
the only, or even as absolutely the best, solution of the problem given, 
but merely as one fairly good and fairly probable. 
Attack. 
In the first place, let us take a general view of the probable course 
of an attack ; we can afterwards go more into detail about the action 
of the different arms 
An army in the neighbourhood of an enemy will have its front 
usually covered by bodies of cavalry, whose duty it will be to screen 
and protect the movements of the troops behind them, while seeking 
to obtain all information possible about the enemy. In the Franco- 
German war this task was carried out with eminent success by the 
German cavalry, the French, at all events in the earlier part of the 
war, making little or no attempt to employ their cavalry in similar 
duties. But it must not be expected that in future wars the cavalry 
on either side will be able to effect its purpose with so little oppositio n 
as the Germans encountered. Both parties will try to play the same 
game, and hence, unquestionably, the first phase of a campaign will 
be a series of cavalry actions. The cavalry that is beaten in these 
first encounters will have to fall back to the protection of the advanced 
guards composed of all arms which will precede the main armies, and 
the victorious cavalry will gain its object of screening its own army 
and obtaining more or less information about the enemy. If the 
cavalry of the advancing army is successful, it will continue to push 
on, driving before it the defeated horse of the defenders. Eventually, 
it will come upon hostile infantry. If these are only in small force, 
part of the cavalry will dismount, and with the aid of its horse artil¬ 
lery attack and drive them off, for one duty of the advanced cavalry 
