Billeting is a mode of feeding and lodging soldiers when they are not in camp or barracks, by quartering them on the inhabitants of a town. Research Billeting
The Negro Plot was an alleged terrorist even that occurred on March the 18th, 1741 in New York. A fire occurred in the chapel and barracks at Fort George on the Battery in New York. It was generally believed to be accidental, but charges were set afloat that it arose from a plot by the negroes to burn the town. Eight other fires of a mysterious nature within a month strengthened this belief. Mary Burton, a servant of one John Hughson, furnished testimony implicating a number of sailors and negroes. Twenty whites and over 160 slaves were seized and imprisoned. Finally Mary Burton's accusations inculpated persons of such character that danger from that direction checked the fury. It was charged that the Spanish were inciting plots among the negroes through Roman Catholic priests. Four whites were hanged, eighteen negroes hanged and thirteen burned at the stake. Research Negro Plot
Archibald Forbes was a Scottish journalist and war correspondent. He was born in 1838 and died in 1900. He received a university education at Aberdeen and served for some years in the Royal Dragoons, but gave up the army for journalism. As war correspondent of the Daily News he was with the German army in 1870 to 1871 during the Franco-Prussian War of 1870, subsequently visiting Paris at the time of the Commune, India during the 1874 famine, and Spain. He accompanied the Prince of Wales in his Indian tour of 1875 to 1876, and was an eye-witness of the Servian war of 1876, and the Russo-Turkish war of 1877, going to Cyprus in 1878. He was under fire during the Afghanistancampaign of 1878 to 1879; next visited Mandalay, and accompanied Lord Chelmsford's army in Zululand, being the first to telegraph home news of the victory of Ulundi in 1880. His health now began to break down, and he devoted himself chiefly to lecturing. His chief publications were: My Experiences in the Franco-German War; Glimpses through the Cannon Smoke; Chinese Gordon; Souvenirs of Some Continents; William I of Germany; Barracks, Bivouacs, and Battles; Havelock; The Afghan Wars; Czar and Sultan; Colin Campbell, LordClyde; Memories and Studies of War and Peace; and Life of Napoleon III. Research Archibald Forbes
Sir Charles Lionel Vaughan-Lee was a British sailor. He was Born in 1867 and died after 1919. He entered the navy in 1880 and was a midshipman on the Minotaur during the Egyptian War of 1882. In 1899 to 1900 he was assistant to the director of naval ordnance, and assistant-director of naval intelligence, 1905. He commanded the Shotleybarracks, Portsmouth, from 1913 to 1914, and in December 1914 was appointed to command the Thunderer. In the Great War he was appointed director of air services, in September 1915, and later became superintendent of Portsmouth dockyard. He became a rear-admiral in 1915, and received the KBE in 1919. Research Charles Vaughan-Lee
Ulysses Simpson Grant (real name Hiram Ulysses Grant, his later name arose from an error in the registration process for his cadetship) was an American soldier, politician and the eighteenth president of the USA from 1869 to 1877. He was born in 1822 at Point Pleasant, Ohio and died in 1885. He attended and graduated West Point military academy, graduated in 1843 and joined the 4th US Infantry at Jefferson Barracks as a brevet second lieutenant, being commissioned a lieutenant, he fought in the Mexican War, and was present at the battles of Palo Alto and Resaca de la Palma among others, and was brevetted captain in 1847 for conduct at Chapultepec. In 1854 he resigned his commission and engaged in business - first in farming near St Louis and later in the leathertrade with his father at galena, Illinois - until 1861 with the declaration of war when he was chosen captain of a company of volunteers. He was soon after the outbreak of the American Civil War given command of the forces at Cairo, Illinois, and in 1861 seized Paducah. In 1862 he gained possession of Fort Henry and Port Donelson, strongly contested points, the surrender of which was the first brilliant victory of the national arms. For this success he was commissioned major-general. In conjunction with the forces of General Buell he defeated the Confederates at Pittsburg Landing and soon afterward was assigned to command in Tennessee. He defeated General Price in 1863 and succeeded in taking Vicksburg from Pendleton after repeated attacks. Having thus secured the Mississippi, he was appointed major-general in the regular army and placed in command of the Western army.
He gained brilliant victories about Chattanooga and was appointed by President Abraham Lincoln to the newly revived rank of lieutenant-general. Leaving Sherman to conduct the chief Western army from Tennessee to the sea, he assumed control of the movements against the Confederates defending Richmond, commanded by General Lee. With dogged persistence and at great sacrifice of life he fought the battles of the Wilderness, Spotsylvania and Cold Harbor, destroying the railways which brought supplies to the Confederates, taking Petersburg in 1865 and compelling the entire command to surrender on April the 9th at Appomattox Court House, thereby ending the American Civil War.
In the period of reconstruction which followed he played a most honourable part, often being placed in difficult positions by the animosity between President Johnson and Congress. In 1868 he was unanimously nominated for President by the Republicans, was elected and served two terms, from 1868 to 1876. During his administration occurred the passage of the Fifteenth Amendment, the funding of the national debt, civil service reform was inaugurated, the Treaty of Washington was negotiated with Great Britain, and specie payment was resumed in 1875. His administration as President was not wholly successful, some of his advisers proving most unworthy. He possessed an unassuming manner, yet was self-reliant and prompt in his decisions, calm and patient in all circumstances, and won the admiration of all by his moral and physical courage. Research Ulysses Simpson Grant
An army is a collection or body of men and or women armed for war, and organized in companies, battalions, regiments, brigades, or similar divisions, under proper officers.
Ancient armies from the time of Rameses II (Sesostris) of Egypt downwards, underwent a series of progressive improvements under the Assyrians, Persians, Greeks, and Carthaginians, until they reached a high degree of perfection under the Romans. In Rome every citizen from the age of seventeen to forty-six was bound to serve in the army. Under the republic a levy took place every year soon after the election of the Consuls. It was superintended by the military tribunes, who at once formed the new levies into legions. Under the empire a standing army was required for maintenance of order in the interior and the defence of the frontiers. In the reign of Augustus the strength of this army reached 450,000 men.
The earliest military system of the Teutonic races consisted of the armed freemen, ruled by elected leaders, but even then there was a personal following or bodyguard of the king or leader. Among the countries of modern Europe the foundation of a standing army was first laid in France. Charles VII of France issued an ordinance for the creation of a number of troops of horse, and a corresponding body of infantry, the whole force amounting to 25,000 men. The superiority of such a body over an assemblage of feudal troops was soon proved, and other states imitated the example of France. By the beginning of the sixteenth century France, Germany, and Spain were all in possession of considerable standing armies. From the middle of the eighteenth century a great change took place in the composition of armies through the reintroduction of the principle of the universal liability of all men capable of bearing arms to military service, or, in other words, through the raising of armies by a general conscription, which was done in every European country except Britain during the 19th century.
Before the Norman conquest the armed force of England consisted essentially of a national militia (called fyrd), in which every landholder was bound to serve when called upon; but the king and some of the great earls maintained bodies of troops out of their private means. Under William The Conqueror and his immediate successors the whole kingdom was divided into upwards of 60,000 knights' fees, every tenant of a fee being bound to attend his lord with horse and arms (or provide a substitute) at his own cost for forty days in each year. When one man held many fees he was bound to furnish the king with one fully equipped horseman for every knight's fee. In course of time it became customary for the king, when the holder of a fee was unable or unwilling to render the service required by his tenure, to accept instead a pecuniary fine (scutage); and these fines enabled the king either to maintain additional troops or to pay the feudal troops to prolong their service. The feudal army thus created almost entirely superseded the national levies of the Anglo-Saxon period, yet these were not altogether given up, and survived to the end of the 19th century in two institutions, the posse comitatus and the militia. The armies with which the English carried on their early wars with France were mostly made up of paid troops, the king usually contracting with some of his most wealthy subjects to levy the number required. At first foreign mercenaries were sometimes included in the troops so raised, but in later times the armies of England were always national. The chief strength of the feudal armies lay in the men-at-arms, who were all mounted, heavily armed, and protected by shields and defensive armour. On the other hand, the paid levies usually consisted of men educated from infancy in the use of the long-bow. The introduction of firearms closed the career of the man-at-arms, and caused the long-bow to be laid aside.
From the accession of Charles I until the reign of William III the army was a constant cause of dispute between the king and the Parliament, the latter fearing that a standing army would be used, as it was elsewhere, as an instrument of tyranny. Under the Commonwealth the first standing army was maintained, but after the Restoration it was reduced to the royal guards, besides what was necessary for two or three garrisons. During the reign of Charles II the forces of England were increased by the addition of a few other regiments, among which was the 1st or Royal Scots, originally the Scottish guard of the kings of France, transferred to England shortly after the Restoration. After Monmouth's rebellion in the reign of James II there was maintained in England a force of 20,000 men, but at the Revolution this army was to a great extent disbanded. The Bill of Bights declared the keeping of a standing army within the kingdom except with the consent of Parliament to be unlawful; but it was found necessary to grant that consent in order to subdue the adherents of James in Ireland, and in the first year of William's reign the army was formally recognized on the basis on which it still exists, that its pay, and hence its strength, remain entirely under the control of the House of Commons. By the so-called Mutiny Act, passed annually from 1689 to 1879, the Parliament formally retained control over the army, as it still does, though the old act is no longer passed. For a long time regiments were raised by contract, the government making an arrangement with some gentleman to raise the men on terms of receiving a certain amount of bounty-money per man, or of being paid by the sale of the regimental commissions, he having the right of nominating the officers. The colonel used to receive a certain sum of money annually for the men's pay and clothing, the expenses of recruiting, etc; and the men might agree to serve for life, for a term of years, or for the duration of the war.
dinary enlistment was for life. During the 18th century the strength of the army fluctuated greatly; then came the long struggle with France, which brought into existence a large army continually under arms, besides an immense body of volunteers and local militia. After the Peninsular war the army was cut down, and was long greatly neglected, while the volunteer force ceased to exist. Only after the Crimean War was reform taken up, the Indian army being taken over, a fresh body of volunteers created, reserves established, etc.
The largest permanent divisions into which modern armies are organized are the army corps. According to the system of localization commenced in 1872, the United Kingdom was divided into regimental districts, in each of which an officer has command of all the forces, including the militia and volunteers. These districts were regarded as the special recruiting areas of the corresponding territorial regiments. The terms of enlistment were for nine years' army service and three years' reserve service. After twelve years service a soldier may be permitted to re-engage for other nine years, and after the completion of twenty-one years' service was entitled to be discharged with a pension. The old system of conferring commissions by purchase was abolished by royal warrant of July the 20th, 1871. First commissions were then given to successful candidates at the Civil Service Commissioners' open examinations, candidates being selected by competition, and entering the cavalry and infantry through the Royal Military College, Sandhurst, the artillery and engineers through the Royal Military Academy, Woolwich; to university students who pass certain examinations; to non-commissioned officers specially recommended ; etc; while promotion was regulated by seniority principally, but partly by selection.
The most important division of the British forces consists of the regular army, which around 1900 numbered about 200,000 men-more or less-exclusive of the British troops serving in India (about 74,000) and paid by the Indian government. Of the component parts of the regular army the infantry of the line was the most numerous. In 1900 it comprised 69 regiments, each with its own special designation, and each attached to some particular district. A few of the regiments had more than four battalions of regulars (apart from militia and volunteers attached), but the majority had only two, each representing one of the old regiments that used to be commonly known by a special number. The regimental titles are generally territorial: BedfordshireRegiment, City of London Regiment, etc, but some are not, such as the Gordon Highlanders, etc. One of the regular battalions was always in garrison or serving outside the kingdom, the other within it. The latter trained the recruits and made good the losses suffered by the battalion serving abroad. In 1900 the full complement of private soldiers in a battalion at home was 760, in the colonies 880, in India 900; the sergeants numbering from 24 to 32, the officers from 24 to 29. In war the full complement of a battalion (904 men armed with rifles) was rather greater than in peace, drivers and others being required in connection with the baggage, ammunition, etc. The battalions in war were not linked together in regiments, but were under the direct orders of the officer commanding the brigade to which they were attached. Mounted infantry were a force embodied and employed only as occasion required, suitable men for the purpose being selected from different infantry regiments. Besides the line regiments, the infantry forces also comprised three regiments of guards: the Grenadier Guards, the Coldstream Guards, and the Scots Guards, each of three battalions, with the Irish Guards of one. The guards, or household troops, had various
leges, and served outside the United Kingdom only in time of war; otherwise being usually stationed in barracks at London, Aldershot, and Windsor.
The cavalry also consisted of guards and of troops of the line. The former comprised three regiments of cuirassiers, the 1st and 2nd Life Guards and the Royal Horse Guards (or Blues), permanently garrisoned in London and Windsor. The cavalry of the line consisted of 28 regiments, designated as dragoons, dragoon guards, hussars, and lancers; the 12 regiments of hussars being also known as light cavalry, the others as heavy. On the war footing a cavalry regiment consisted of three squadrons, and numbers a total of 531 officers and men. The cavalry generally were armed with carbines and sabres, the lancers carried lances in addition. While service in the infantry was for nine years with the colours and three in the reserve, men were enlisted in the cavalry of the line for eight years with the colours and four in the reserve.
The artillery was not divided into regiments like the cavalry and infantry, but the field, horse, and garrison artillery formed together a single body (about 55,000 strong), called the Royal Regiment of Artillery, the field and horseartillery being divided into a large number of 'batteries', the garrison artillery into companies. Of these batteries a certain number were mountain-batteries (for special service). On the war footing, a battery of horseartillery had 165 men, a battery of field artillery 157, the great majority consisting of gunners and drivers. Every battery had 6 guns, those of the field artillery being heavier than those of the horseartillery. The field artillery acted with the infantry, and the gunners were not mounted but carried on the gun-carriages; the horseartillery went with the cavalry, the gunners being mounted for rapid movement. The garrison artillery was distributed over the various fortresses and garrisons.
To a special corps, the Royal Engineers, belong the construction and maintenance of military works and fortifications, military telegraphs and railways, pontoons, military balloons, etc. Another branch of the regular army was the Army Service Corps, which had to attend to transport, the purchase and issue of provisions, forage, light, fuel, the appointments of barracks, etc. It was organized in companies, which were allotted to the several brigades or other units of the army, and it comprised bakers, butchers, saddlers, farriers, clerks, etc.
The medical services called for by the army are rendered by the Royal Army Medical Corps, under the director-general and staff of the army medical service. The officers are divided into ranks corresponding to those of the rest of the army, from surgeon - generals, surgeon - colonels, etc, downwards. The privates largely consist of men that have to attend to the ambulances and other means of conveyance. Other departments of the regular army are the ordnance corps, army pay department, veterinary department, military police, etc. What were generally designated as the auxiliary forces consisted of the army reserves, militia and militia reserve, imperial yeomanry, and volunteers. The army reserve of infantry consisted of men who had served with the colours during the period for which they enlisted for active service, and were liable in case of war to be again called up for service with the particular branch of the army to which they still belonged (receiving meanwhile a small pension). The militia was a force of old standing that had repeatedly rendered valuable services to the country. The force was intended to provide a number of trained men by which, on important emergencies, the regular troops might be supplemented or relieved. It consisted chiefly of a large number of battalions of infantry of the line, linked with those belonging to the territorial regiments, the men being enlisted for a period of six years, and being called up annually for a short period of drill and training. During the 19th century measures were taken for increasing the efficiency of the militia, and a militia reserve was formed. The volunteer force was formed in 1859, and was largely self-supporting, though it also received certain grants from government. Like the militia, it formed a number of battalions attached to the line regiments in their respective districts. The force proved very popular, but some authorities maintained that its efficiency was not equal to its numbers, and
e changes were proposed early on. The Imperial Yeomanry, or Yeomanry Cavalry, were a force that came into existence as a volunteer force in the beginning of the 19th century, being intended to furnish mounted troops for home defence. The force was reorganized at the end of the 19th century, and formed a body of more than fifty regiments, in which were absorbed certain volunteer companies of light horse and mounted infantry. The members provided themselves with horses, and receive a certain sum as daily pay during their period of training, with an allowance also for a horse.
Army administration and reorganization underwent major changes during the 20th century. The strength of the British army by the scheme of March, 1905, was: regulars, 192,697; reserve, 80,000; militia, 148,000; yeomanry, 28,000; volunteers, 250,000; besides over 78,000 men for India and the colonies.
Before the Second World War and the upheavals that followed, a large number of men raised in the United Kingdom were always serving abroad, in India and the colonies, but some of the British colonies had bodies of troops raised and maintained by themselves. The Indian army alone constantly absorbed drafts of men from the home countries, since there were always about 74,000 British regulars in it, besides native troops raised in India more than twice that number. The Indian army as a whole stood quite apart from the British army proper. This army had its own commander-in-chief and its own organization, and was paid from the revenues raised in India itself. Under the commander-in-chief were three great commands, those of the northern (Punjab), the western (Bombay), and the eastern (Bengal) army corps, besides the commands or districts of Madras and Burma. Both the British and the Indian regular forces comprised infantry, cavalry, and artillery; and there were volunteers, army reserves, and a body known as 'imperial service troops', kept up by native states, besides a frontier militia for the north-west frontier, and a military police, also serving on frontier duty. The native regiments were partly under British officers.
After the Great War the British Regular Army was a reproduction of the pre-war army and its reserves, established mainly on the basis of reforms instituted during the War Secretaryship of Haldane, with the improvements suggested by the Great War. The previous reforms had established a spirit of co-ordination and professional dignity. The militia had been replaced by a Special Reserve; the efficient Territorial Force replaced the old Volunteers; the General Staff was brought into being, and later the Imperial General Staff. The O.T.C. system began in 1909, and the creation of a small expeditionary force, to serve in emergency, was an innovation that splendidly proved its utility. The establishment of the pre-war regular army in the financial year 1914-15 was as follows: British troops - regimental establishments, 168,500 all ranks; British army in India, 75,896 all ranks; total, 244,396. The immense armies raised during the Great War having in the course of 1919 been almost entirely demobilized, Parliament was asked in the opening session of 1920 to sanction an establishment of approximately 220,000 men, exclusive of the army in India, which then consisted of 68,000 British troops and 164,000 Indian troops.
The British army after the Great War was distributed in general accordance with the Cardwellian system i.e., half abroad and half at home. The home units were to supply the units abroad in time of peace with drafts. The units abroad would absorb the reserves, who on mobilization would raise the units at home to full war strength. The home units would be organized so as to form, on mobilization, a force consisting of infantry, artillery, and mechanized units, and this force was the central reserve of the British Empire, available to be sent in time of trouble to any part of the world. Behind each linked battalion of the regular army there was a militia battalion. This militia battalion discharged the function hitherto discharged by the special reserve and the extra special reserve of supplying drafts for the regular battalions which were sent out of the country in time of war. There were 74 militia battalions, and it was assumed that they were capable, when the country was engaged in a war of no more than a few months' probable duration, of taking the field for the extension of the regular army - an assumption proved incorrect when the Second World War broke out a few years later. These forces - the regulars and militia battalions - constituted the first line of the British army, the second line being constituted by the 14 territorial infantry divisions and the cavalry division of the territorial army (yeomanry).
The improvements suggested by experience in the Great War were many and varied, but the rigid economy required in the national life after the armistice reduced the realization of these improvements to the lowest limits.
(1) Tanks. The big surprise of the Great War was the tank, or armoured land cruiser, for breaking through defensive organizations. Since 1919 progress was made in the evolution of this formidable weapon and a separate tank corps was revived, and mechanization of the army further proceeded by the conversion of certain cavalry units.
(2) Education A striking feature of the post-Great War army was the introduction, as a permanent and integral feature of the new army, of a system of compulsory education, both academic and technical, in unit schools, such as will ensure that any soldier on leaving the army would find employment in civil life instead of being, as in past times, shut out through a lack of appropriate skills.
In the War of 1812, on May the 5th, 1814, Sir James Yeo with about 3000 land troops and marines attacked Oswego which was defended by a fort garrisoned by 300 men under ColonelMitchell. The first attack was repulsed by a heavy cannon placed near the shore. The second attack, the next day, was successful, and the garrison retreated up the river. The British withdrew after burning the barracks and seizing the stores and a war schooner. The American loss was sixty-nine men; the British, nineteen. Research Assault of Oswego
Barracks are buildings for soldiers, especially when in garrison. Originally the term meant temporary huts, by the 1920s it was applied to a permanent structure or set of buildings. Research Barracks
The Battle of Ogdensburg New York was a defeat for the Americans on February the 22nd, 1813. Colonel McDonell, with 800 British soldiers, attacked the village and also Fort Presentation, commanded-by ColonelForsyth. An initial attack upon the fort was repulsed, but that on the village was successful. The British now reformed and moved against the fort which, however, had meanwhile been evacuated, the Americans fleeing to Black Lake, nine miles away. Two armed sloops and the barracks were burned, the village plundered, and fifty-two prisoners made. The American loss was five killed, fifteen wounded, and fifty-two captutred; the British, six killed and forty-eight wounded. Research Battle of Ogdensburg
Today its 1st Battalion, a regular army unit, is stationed in Paderborn in Germany, and its 4th Battalion, a territorial army unit, is based in barracks in the Regiment's two counties. Since 1945 the regular battalions have seen active service in Malaya, Kenya, Cyprus, Guiana, Belize, Northern Ireland and in 1995 served with United Nations forces in Bosnia. The present regular battalion is an armoured infantry one equipped with Warrior armoured personnel carriers in the 1st (UK) Armoured Division part of NATO' s Allied Rapid Reaction Force. The Regiment has strong links with its home counties of Devon and Dorset which is its main area of recruitment. The majority of soldiers in the Regiment come from the two counties and, besides having the Freedom of 12 cities and towns, the Regiment maintains close affiliations with many organisations in the counties, and with the Cadet Forces and also runs a flourishing association to keep all who have served in the Regiment in touch with each other. Research Devonshire and Dorset Regiment
The Probert Encyclopaedia was designed, edited and programed by
Matt and Leela Probert
Abbreviations
Research Billeting
