SILVER MEDAL PRIZE ESSAY, 1895. 351 
duties to perform “Garrison Artillery,’ and we do so presumably to 
denote in a general way what its duties are. If we enquire what is 
meant by the term Garrison Artillery we must perhaps admit that it 
necessarily has a somewhat indefinite meaning; but if it is difficult to 
attach an exact meaning to this term, it is not less easy to predicate of 
it, that it cannot and does not mean merely ‘ Coast Artillery,” that is 
Artillery employed on sea fronts, whose sole business is the attack of 
war vessels; and yet with the exception of a few Companies which are 
detailed as Siege train or Heavy batteries, the whole of the so-called 
Garrison Artillery is at present trained only to fight guns on sea fronts, 
and thus becomes a Coast Artillery and ceases to be a Garrison Artil- 
lery. The word Garrison certainly connotes a Fortress and with it the 
idea of general duties varying with the locality and importance of the 
Fortress. But the duties of any Fortress including Coast Fortresses 
are not confined to defeating an attack by ships’ guns and yet Garrison 
Artillery Drill, Vol. I., is devoted almost entirely to this one object. 
This is either a confusion of terms or a misapprehension of their mean- 
ing, if the former let us call our Companies Coast Artillery Companies 
if the latter let us train our Companies so that they may be able to 
perform Garrison duties. Garrison is the term we use, and ought to 
keep to, but we must understand that it is synonymous with Fortress, 
and connotes certain general duties that are necessarily indefinite, and 
therefore by implication denies the existence of only special duties. 
It has been my endeavour in this essay by enumerating the different 
forms of attacks on Coast Fortresses, and examining the probability of 
their occurrence, under various circumstances, to ascertain what the 
duties of Artillery Garrisons in war time are likely to be, and hence to 
formulate a system of training that will be suitable to the requirements 
of all cases. This examination has led to the following conclusions. 
1. That the attack by war ships on Coast Fortresses is by no means 
the most general, or the most important form of attack to be expected. 
2. That therefore our present system of training which deals 
almost exclusively with this aspect of war, is a too particular one, and 
requires generalisation and simplification to meet the other more 
frequent, and important needs of Coast Defence. 
3. That in modifying this system of training care should be had 
to the requirements of the different units composing the Artillery 
Garrison, their training being in accordance with the duties that are 
expected from them, and that therefore R.A. Companies whose duties 
at different times cannot be particularly defined, must receive a 
different training from that sufficient for the Auxiliary Artillery whose 
duties being always the same are clearly marked and quite definite. 
4, ‘That the training for the R.A. should be, (a) General in the 
application of the broad principles that underly the fighting of all guns. 
(0) Special in the particular adaptation of these principles to the 
working of those guns which each Company may at the time being be 
called upon to fight. 
o. ‘That the training for the Auxiliary Artillery need only be with 
A8 
Conclusion 
