Please see the [Transcriber’s Notes] at the end of the text for some important remarks on this transcription.

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A
MILITARY DICTIONARY,

OR,

EXPLANATION OF THE SEVERAL SYSTEMS OF DISCIPLINE OF DIFFERENT KINDS OF TROOPS,

INFANTRY, ARTILLERY, AND CAVALRY;

THE PRINCIPLES OF FORTIFICATION,

AND

ALL THE MODERN IMPROVEMENTS IN THE
SCIENCE OF TACTICS:

COMPRISING

THE POCKET GUNNER, OR LITTLE BOMBARDIER;

THE MILITARY REGULATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES; THE WEIGHTS,
MEASURES, AND MONIES OF ALL NATIONS;

THE TECHNICAL TERMS AND PHRASES OF THE ART OF WAR
IN THE FRENCH LANGUAGE.

PARTICULARLY ADAPTED TO THE USE OF THE MILITARY INSTITUTIONS
OF THE UNITED STATES:

BY WILLIAM DUANE,

LATE LIEUTENANT COLONEL IN THE ARMY OF THE UNITED STATES,
AND AUTHOR OF THE AMERICAN MILITARY LIBRARY.

An army without discipline is but a mob in uniform, more dangerous to itself than to its enemy. Should any one from ignorance not perceive the immense advantages that arise from a good discipline, it will be sufficient to observe the alterations that have happened in Europe since the year 1700. Saxe.

I am fully convinced that the tactics of Frederic II. the causes of his superiority, of his system of battles and lines, and of his most skilful movements have been wholly misunderstood to the present time, and that the actions of this great man have been attributed to maxims diametrically opposite to his real principles. Jomini.....1808.

PHILADELPHIA:
PRINTED AND PUBLISHED BY WILLIAM DUANE,
NO. 98, MARKET STREET.

1810.

DISTRICT OF PENNSYLVANIA, TO WIT:

BE IT REMEMBERED, that on the Tenth day of August, in the Thirty Fifth year of the Independence of the United States of America, A. D. 1810, William Duane of the said district, hath deposited in this office, the title of a book, the right whereof he claims as proprietor, in the words following, to wit: “A Military Dictionary; or, Explanation of the several systems of discipline of different kinds of Troops, Infantry, Artillery, and Cavalry; the Principles of Fortification, and all the Modern Improvements in the Science of Tactics: comprising the Pocket Gunner, or Little Bombardier; the Military Regulations of the United States; the Weights, Measures, and Monies of all Nations; the Technical Terms and Phrases of the Art of War in the French language. Particularly adapted to the use of the Military institutions of the United States: by William Duane, late lieutenant colonel in the army of the United States, and author of the American Military Library. An army without discipline is but a mob in uniform, more dangerous to itself than to its enemy. Should any one from ignorance not perceive the immense advantages that arise from a good discipline, it will be sufficient to observe the alterations that have happened in Europe since the year 1700. Saxe. I am fully convinced that the tactics of Frederic II. the causes of his superiority, of his system of battles and lines, and of his most skilful movements have been wholly misunderstood to the present time, and that the actions of this great man have been attributed to maxims diametrically opposite to his real principles. Jomini....1808.”

In conformity to the Act of the Congress of the United States, intituled “an Act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned.” And also to the Act, entitled “an Act supplementary to an Act, entitled ‘an Act for the encouragement of learning, by securing the copies of maps, charts, and books, to the authors and proprietors of such copies during the times therein mentioned,’ and extending the benefits thereof to the arts of designing, engraving, and etching historical and other prints.”

D. CALDWELL,
Clerk of the District of Pennsylvania.

ELUCIDATORY PREFACE.

When the editor first undertook to prepare a Military Library for general use, he was stimulated thereto by perceiving the total decay of military information, and the gross errors, in particulars the most simple and essential, which every where had superceded or obstructed useful knowlege. War at the moment seemed to be impending. There was no organization of the militia, nor any system established, excepting an incomplete elementary hand book, formed during the revolution, and adapted to fix those who had already some military experience of the first evolutions of a battalion, in a common method.

This book, no way calculated to teach the initiatory exercises, nor to give an idea of the combined manœuvres of larger bodies; nor any method of instruction, nor the duties of any other body than an infantry battalion, was improperly dignified with the name of a system. The most elevated in power as well as the most subordinate in military or militia duty, adopted this false notion of a system, without enquiring further than that it was established. When such a tract was held forth as sufficient by the authority of law and by the silent indifference of those who knew or ought to know better, it is not at all surprizing that every other object of military study was neglected, since every other was announced to be superfluous.

This state of general indifference or unacquaintance with the business of war, gave rise to the American Military Library; in which the editor intended originally to have comprehended a vocabulary of military terms; and had made so much progress in its preparation, as to discover that it would make a large book, and that any thing short of a minute and comprehensive Dictionary, would be leaving the undertaking still incomplete. The general want of knowlege on the subject, the inaccuracy of the notions which prevailed, and above all the great revolutions which modern times had produced in the whole economy and ordination of military science, decided the editor upon the necessity of rendering the undertaking as complete as practicable, by giving to the public a competent book of reference, so necessary to study in the acquisition of every species of knowlege.

After some numbers of the Library had been published, the French Military Dictionary of 1768, and the English Military Dictionary of major James, fell into the editor’s hands. These works rendered much of what had been already done superfluous, though not entirely useless; the French work had been antiquated long before the revolution, by the changes which took place in the French establishment in 1788 and 1791, and still more by the total renovation which it underwent during the revolution. The English Dictionary labored under difficulties of another nature; adapted to England alone, the military system of England, called by the name of Dundas, which was only a modification of the Prussian system of Saldern, and the French system formed in imitation of the Prussian after the seven years war, must necessarily be to a British officer the standard of a work published for the British army; accordingly, although major James, both from his fine understanding and experience, was well acquainted with the defects of that system, he was still under the necessity of making it his standard.

In undertaking to give a work to the American people, the publication of either the French or English Dictionary, though it might equally profit the bookseller, would be only imposing upon the public, instead of giving the best information and the most recent and approved principles and improvements in the art of war: it was necessary therefore almost to re-write, and to augment to a vast bulk the quantity of information. The whole has been, therefore, modelled and adapted throughout to the modern principles of discipline and general tactics. So much of what is old has been retained as may give some correct ideas of the systems of other nations; and the body of information, as well as of words of reference, renders this the most ample and particular Military Dictionary that has been published in the language.

To the general mass has been added the useful little work called the Little Bombardier, or Pocket Gunner, originally compiled for the British artillerists from the French Manuel de l’Artilleur of Durtubie. The measures of extent and capacity, and the monies of all foreign nations: under the words Tactics, Military Schools, Topographical Depot, Money, Weights and Measures, Valor, and generally throughout the work will be found a vast body of new information, particularly adapted to the communication of correct knowlege to all who wish to comprehend military subjects.

A too prevalent error, and the most fatal if we should ever be engaged in war, and not acquire more perfect and general knowlege, is, that the art of war requires neither study nor much attention to what is called discipline; and this error has obtained a sort of sanctity from the triumphs of our undisciplined yeomanry over the British, Hanoverian, Wurtemburg, and Hessian veterans in our revolution. Undoubtedly without an examination into the causes of the triumphs in a more particular manner than general history presents, the assumption is very imposing, and adapted to flatter self-love and national pride.

These natural and often useful passions must, nevertheless, be restrained like all others within the bounds of reason; and, in order to avoid the danger which may flow from our prejudices, we must endeavor to consider our own circumstances with eyes as dispassionate as we should those of strangers. We must enquire, what was the state of military knowlege in the armies of the invaders; whether they exhibited any of the great qualities which constitute well disciplined troops or great generals; whether the whole course of their military transactions was not a series of blunders, produced by their ignorance of our people and country; and even in a great degree owing to the want of talents in the officers of the enemy, to supply by their genius and spirit of enterprize, the disadvantages under which they labored. It would require only an enumeration of a few facts to shew, that although the patience with which the American troops endured hardships and privations, afford glorious examples of the military virtues; that even these great virtues, conducted as they were, by a general who united in himself the military qualities of a Fabius and a Scipio, could not have had so much success were it not for the want of a good discipline, and the utter incapacity of the generals of the British army.

In the modern wars of the French revolution, the like truths have been demonstrated as in the American contest. The British armies had been merely taught the duties of parade, and when they came into the field, had to learn by hard fighting and severe defeats, that their officers were generally ignorant of the art of war; for they were beaten once more by raw troops ably conducted to the field by experienced officers, who possessed skill, who had made military science their study; and, above all, who knew how to take advantage of the incompetency of the British leaders.

Mankind in every country, educated in the same way, varies very little in those points which are adapted to military services. It must, therefore, in a great measure depend upon the education which is applied to military affairs, in the discipline of armies, whether they are victors or vanquished. All nations profess to have acted upon this opinion, though there seems not to be that attention paid to the subject, nor to education of any kind, which the acknowleged importance of the case calls for. This indifference or heedlessness has at times infected all nations, and may be considered as a disease, which if not cured at a certain stage, ensures destruction.

The triumphs of Spain before the peace of Vervins in 1598, is a most important part of history for the study of men fond of military enquiries; the infantry of Spain was then the first in Europe; we have seen in the years 1808 and 1809, that the extinction, by the neglect of military knowlege, has left Spain, with ten millions of people, an easy conquest. Austria and Prussia have successively shone preeminent on the military theatre of Europe. The daily parades at Berlin, which Frederic II. conducted himself for many years, and from which strangers were excluded, were only lessons of experiment and instruction by which he formed his own mind to the conviction of the power of rapid movement, and close evolutions by small divisions; divisions moving in different modes, and by different points, in apparent disorder but by the most exact laws, to one common point of action. Here it was that he contrived those methods which he accomplished in action afterwards, and which enabled him, with a force not equal to half the Austrian army, to baffle, defeat, and triumph over all Europe. It will be useful for the man of sense to consider, whether Frederic could have performed such wonders in the field, without this previous practice himself, and the previous discipline which rendered his armies of 40,000 as manageable as a battalion of 500 men. Perhaps we shall be told that Steuben’s tract renders all these considerations unnecessary.

The military triumphs of modern France have been ascribed to a multitude of causes; really, perhaps, the causes of her military successes may be reduced to two. First, the necessity which arose out of what has been preposterously called the balance of power in Europe, which under the pretence of maintaining an equality of nations, has been the real mask for reiterated wars, conquests, plunder, and desolation; Spain, Austria, and France, have been at different periods held up as aspiring to universal dominion; under the color of resisting the aggrandizement of either, they have been for two centuries constantly engaged in efforts to plunder each other. France, from her position, was from the passions of the age, forced to be prepared for the defensive; and in several successive wars had made conquests on her extremities, which rendered it daily more necessary to maintain a military establishment; and at length, after suffering great disasters, and thereby producing a succession of great generals, the passions and character of the people became military.

Taught by triumphs and disasters, the causes of success and failure, her generals and statesmen directed their attention to the perfection of all the branches of military institution; the management of weapons, the array of troops, the plans of marches, the supply of armies, the passage of rivers, and the simplification of every species of duty. Colleges were instituted, the sciences were enlisted in the military service, and it was difficult to tell in which class of citizens the greatest military enthusiasm prevailed....the nobles who alone could aspire to command, or the privates who composed the rank and file of armies.

It is to these institutions, through which the path to honor and renown lay, that France owes her present preeminence. Under several heads of this Dictionary will be found the facts upon which this opinion is sustained; other nations rather aped than emulated her institutions; while France pursued the spirit of the Romans who adopted every weapon which they found powerful in the hands of their enemies; France adopted the prolonged line of the Austrians, or abandoned it to pursue the concentric movements of Prussia; those echellons which under another name were among the manœuvres of Scipio and Gustavus Adolphus, and which so many have affected to laugh at as novelties, because they know neither their history nor their use; were recommended by Guibert in 1763, as the column had been before recommended by Folard; and each of whom had been calumniated and their tactics reprobated, by the enemies of innovation, or rather by the blockheads of their day, a class of beings of which some are to be found every where.

The rapid principles of Frederic, and the evolutions of the echellon and column adapted to the concentric method of movement, upon oblique as well as direct lines; and all executed with a combined precision before unusual, constitute the great features of the modern tactics. Simplicity of method in instruction is the key to it.

It must be evident to the humblest understanding, that a great part of the success of armies in war must depend as much upon the knowlege of the enemies’ mode of movement and action, as well as in the perfection, precision, and promptitude of execution in their own. Voltaire, whose history of Europe is alike admirable for its conciseness and authenticity, since all his information on military affairs was drawn from the military depot established at Versailles, speaking of the battle of Rosbach, attributes the defeat of the French under Soubise to their ignorance of the new methods of movement which had been introduced by Frederic II. The soldiers saw that the old method of battle was changed; they did not comprehend the motions of the Prussians, which were not merely novel, but as exact as the movements on a parade; they believed they saw their masters in the art of war, they were dismayed and fled.

This anecdote, which has many resemblances in ancient history, is of great moment in directing the understanding to the consideration of military institution. It leaves no doubt of the necessity of knowing the art of war as it is practised by other nations, and especially the importance of practising that which has proved superior to all others.

A fatality has attended all the efforts which have been made for several years to introduce a suitable organization of the militia, and a correct military system. The genius of ignorance appears to have cast a spell over all the attempts that have been made. Like the projector who was so much occupied by the erection of a weathercock, that he set about it before the foundation for the steeple was laid, every attempt has been made at the wrong end; a part has been mistaken for a whole, composed of numerous parts, and the wrong part has always been chosen first. America, which has been so original in the revolution as to give rise to the institution of rifle corps, which have decided seven-eighths of the battles that have been fought in Europe since; has been led to resort constantly to the very system of which America proved the futility, for precepts and examples; instead of profiting by the march of science, we have gone for instruction to the worst military institutions of Europe. When any person intrusted with the military concerns of the U. States wants information, it is to authorities exploded and condemned by men of military knowlege, reference is made. A minister of England in addressing that nation in 1806, at the very moment when it was announced to that nation that the bellum ad internicionem had only then begun..... that “the war was now at the foot of her walls,” had the honesty, which times of danger extracts even from ministers, to declare....“The military system of England was equally in want of repairs, or rather a thorough rebuilding, even to its foundation stone.” There is no truth more certain, yet it is to this tattered and defenceless fabric we resort for models on every occasion. The bill for establishing a quarter-master general’s department, which was before congress in 1809-10, is a scion of this decayed tree; no doubt that as long as the present apology for a system exists, the proposed department may serve, as a crutch is of use to a body stricken with paralysis.

Military science even in France, where it has now reached the greatest perfection, has had to struggle with selfishness and the occasional and almost insuperable difficulties, which the appointment of ministers incompetent and inexperienced in military affairs, threw in their way. Folard is reputed to have died broken-hearted, by the persecution which he experienced from stupid generals and ministers who looked to nothing but official patronage. Levrilliere, whose admirable improvements in the various departments of artillery, to whom is owing the reduction of the length and the weight of metal of guns of the same calibre, was persecuted out of France, and obliged to take refuge in the army of Austria, where his services proved so formidable as to induce his recall, and the final adoption of his vast improvements; those improvements which, by lessening the weight of artillery, have led to the powerful institution of horse artillery.

Wise nations are never disposed to reject the useful because it is not of their own invention. The Austrians after the battle of Austerlitz immediately abolished their old discipline, and the archduke Charles instituted a better system upon the principles of the modern French. Even the French themselves, surrounded by triumphs, have not yet deemed the science of war perfect. New dispositions of the column were adopted in Egypt; it was only in 1808 that the regulations for the exercise and manœuvres of Cavalry were completed; and even since the campaign which closed with the battle of Wagram, they have made some important alterations in the arms of their cavalry, founded either on the experience of inconvenience in their own, or of some superior advantages in those of their enemy.

The conclusions which we draw from these facts are, that the prevalence of erroneous opinions on the military institutions is a subject of very serious concern; because it is evident, that so long as a nation or a government, which has the care of the national concerns, and a great influence over its opinions, suffers ignorance and prejudice to occupy the place of intelligence, a similar fate may be considered as the consequence, whenever the nation shall be attacked, as other negligent or ignorant nations have been, by a power of superior knowlege and capacity in the art of war.

Nothing more plainly shews the misconception which generally prevails, especially in the legislatures of the Union and the several states, than the contradictory motives which are assigned for leaving the militia and military system in their present state of disorganization. Some plead that the art of war is laid down in Steuben; others that Steuben carried us through the revolution; when in fact both Burgoyne and Cornwallis were taken before Steuben’s tract was introduced; others are for arming our militia with pikes alone, forgetting that an open country is that for which pikes are best adapted; and that to render pikes effective there must be a most perfect discipline of manœuvre, which may render the line as potent and firm as the column, and as easily displayed, concentrated, and formed to various fronts as the best disciplined infantry; when the new modes of movement are mentioned, they are called novelties, though the principal of them are as old as the battle of Pharsalia, and were in practice at the battle of Lutzen; other exceptions are, that besides being new, the modern discipline is too difficult to learn, too perplexed and fatiguing; that the multiplied manœuvres require more time and labor, and must be in a great measure useless; and that so satisfied are the British of this that they have reduced them all to nineteen manœuvres. Nothing so truly depicts the want of judgment or a proper attention to the subject, as observations like these.....the truth is that the modern principles of instruction are fewer in number, more easily taught and understood, and less irksome to the soldier; better adapted to engage the soldier’s attention and afford him gratification; that the variety and number of evolutions is not more various than the eternal variety of ground by which military movements and dispositions are always governed; and that the new discipline, by teaching the first elements well, enables the military body to be moved by these principles on any ground, and not only to form any disposition that it is possible to form, but without having been previously formed in such new dispositions; the elementary principles of modern discipline being peculiarly adapted to the understanding, and the movements by small bodies, enabling every officer of a small portion of troops to move his particular corps by the mode best adapted to the ground.

It must always be the fault of the government if its military institutions are erroneous. If there were but a single regiment, that should be instructed according to the best principles, and made to practise whatever was most useful and necessary in the art of war. In a nation of freemen the regular force should constantly exhibit their exercises and evolutions, so that every citizen should be familiar with the best practice of the use of arms and of manœuvres. The eye may be said to have an infallible memory, it is above all other of the organs of sense the best medium of intelligence. The United States troops are usually cooped up in garrisons, as if they were, like the king of Prussia, forming a system in secret, while in fact there is nothing worthy of the name of discipline carried on, and in too many instances nothing understood. Perhaps the troops of the United States have not, as a part of discipline, fired a ball at a target for twenty years. Field artillery, or mortar practice, probably not more frequent. The maxim of economy is an important one in a free state, but there is an economy more destructive than the greatest profusion; and that is the economy of practical and useful knowlege.

We speak of these things reluctantly, but the evil is almost a disease, and requires the regard of the intelligent men in all parts of the nation.

What is then requisite for the United States?

It will be said that there is some difficulty in effecting any improvement. Unquestionably so it is, and so it ever will be. But the government is bound not to regard difficulties, when they are put in competition with the dangers which may flow from neglect. The government possesses the power, and the army is bound, and the country is anxious to possess a more complete system in lieu of the once useful but at present useless tract of baron Steuben. The difficulties are not so great as may be at first sight supposed, and may be surmounted in a way rather to serve as a pleasure than a difficulty to the army and militia. The elements of modern exercise might be first introduced, they are neither so numerous, so perplexed, nor so unnatural as the old forms; neither are they so tiresome to the teacher or the taught. They have also another advantage, that the soldier is not as heretofore stiffened and set up like an embalmed Egyptian mummy; the modern method takes any number from 10 to 100 men, and places them in an easy position erect without constraint of head, or limbs, or body; and proceeds by familiarizing the ear to equal time by the action of the feet of the whole squad or company; after which they are all taught to face to either hand or about, indifferently, and never in one routine; the mode of moving the limbs and the time of movement is ever the same; and the words of command few, simple, and plain; where they in any case differ from the usual words of common life the teacher’s duty is to explain them often, until the ears of all are familiar with their practical meaning.

The next process is advancing, at a given length of pace in equal times; and this is combined with facings, and at last with wheelings, in whole ranks, or in sections of any given numbers, always varying, diminishing, and augmenting at discretion the numbers of the sections, by drawing from the right of each successive section in the rear of the first, to the left of the leading section, a number sufficient to augment the first to the number required, and so of every section from front to rear; the drill is thus carried on always with moving feet at the time of gay dancing music, and when marching always at a pace of 24 inches.

After the squad of 20 or 100 is found complete in these minute branches of marking time, advancing at time, facing and wheeling, augmenting and diminishing sections, they are taught the oblique wheelings and facings, or as the modern words are half or quarter facing, or half or quarter wheeling; and to march dressed in these several orders, so as to form exactly in the same relative position to each other when wheeled or faced to their primitive position.

Thus much may be well taught, and comprehended, and practised in two or three weeks, employing only two or three hours at each drill, and twice each day.

The instruction of the pivots or flank men of ranks and sections, go along with the first wheelings; and as soon as the uses of the pivots are generally understood, then the whole are formed into double ranks; and the men are prepared to execute any of the modern evolutions or manœuvres; it being always calculated that the officers are equally diligent and as well drilled as the men, and competent not only to comprehend but to correct an error when it occurs.

At this stage, and not before, arms should be put into their hands; and a manual exercise of some kind taught, for it is not material what the motions are so that the firing and loading motions are taught to be performed with dexterity and ease. The drill is then manœuvred once a day with arms, and the officer who feels a proper sense of the importance of the habit of command, and the advantage of giving troops the practice of movement, will diversify his own pleasures and gratify his men, by moving them into all the various positions of column, line, echellons, movements by heads of sections, changing flanks and fronts, taking new alignements, countermarching in the various modes of which modern military works furnish such useful and abundant examples.

The elements of the first drills with minute instructions might be comprised in a hand book of one half the compass of Steuben’s tract; and this elementary work placed in the hands of all descriptions of troops, infantry, artillery, and cavalry, should be the first rule of practice for them all in common. This introduced, the government could at leisure prepare instructions for a more comprehensive course of manœuvres, and particularly hand books upon the same simple principles of drills for artillery, riflemen, and cavalry, in their particular branches of duty. It being to be understood as a fundamental principle, that as the movements and action of all kinds of troops are regulated by the movements of infantry; or in other words, as infantry compose the main body, line, or column; the riflemen, artillery, and cavalry must be governed in their movements by the main body, to which they are appendages or auxiliaries; and it is therefore required that they should know themselves how to execute the infantry manœuvres, in order that they should not, like the French at Rosbach, be confounded by movements of which they are ignorant.

The profound mathematician may look down from the elevation of abstract science upon the cold common place of syllabic combination and Arabic numerical notation; but he owes his first knowlege to the alphabet of language and arithmetic; here he must have begun, and here the military man of whatever grade must also begin. He must learn the alphabet of military knowlege at the drill, he must take his lessons and learn them; he must study and practice what he has learned there, in order to teach; and the officer must learn both to command others and to obey. There is no science which may not be attained by earnest application and practice. But no science or art can be acquired or understood without both; and the more carefully that study is pursued and the more frequently it is practised, the more efficient will it be in the individual and in the regular mass of individuals. But practice is above all requisite, careful, frequent, constant, obstinately pursued practice.

But this is not yet a system.

We have exhibited the elementary branch of military instruction first, merely because it is the point at which every military body must commence; because this is what is now most wanted, and because while it is carrying into practical use, the general system containing all the purposes and uses of an efficient military establishment may in the mean time be prepared and digested.

Having treated so much on this subject, its importance will excuse the discussion of it more at large. To the perfection of a military establishment for the U. States two things are essential.

The first is, that it should be such as to be equally applicable in its operation to the militia and to the army of the U. States, whenever the former are called forth.

The second, that every act and duty appertaining to the military establishment should be transacted by none other than men subject to military order, control, and responsibility; and liable to be put in motion or brought to account for delay or neglect in a military manner.

These two principles lead to the consideration of what would be an efficient military organization; and here we have a host of formidable enemies, ignorance, a disorderly mass; indolence and idleness, hanging on the flanks; the steady habits of old prejudice ever alarmed for its patronage or its place; all immediately exclaim, would there not be great confusion produced by abrogating some duties and introducing others. We shall not skirmish with this motley and unmilitary groupe; we shall come to the point. In considering the subject, it will be found that the present war department in fact corresponds with what is called the general staff in other countries; the president representing the commander in chief, the secretary at war chief of the staff. From this fact it will be perceived, that whatever improvements might take place in the system, it would at first consist only of defining and distributing the duties and details of service by the war department.

After defining and arranging the various heads of service, they should of course be classed according to analogy or the dependency of one kind upon another; so that there would be several heads, under each of which the inferior branches of duty might be distributed. At the head of one of the superior branches should be placed a responsible officer, who would have the superintendance of all the duties, and the direction and control of all those placed in the execution of the subordinate branches; this officer to be responsible to the executive directly in peace; and when the arrangements became necessarily distinct in the field, to become responsible to the commanding officer in the field. These heads of branches should be the efficient staff of the military institution, it is through the perfection of the organization of the staff, and the rigid responsibility for the due execution and for seeing all under them duly performed, that modern tactics is in an eminent degree indebted for its preeminency and its triumphs. Precision, promptitude, and provident foresight, are their invariable laws, and upon these being perfect depends all the success of modern military science; but it must be taken in connexion also with the disciplinary principles which go into action, where the same provident foresight, the same precision, and the same celerity of motion ensure success to all that is undertaken against any force, however numerous and brave, destitute of a system equally provident and combined in its operations.

To commence an efficient system we must take the outline upon the largest scale; that is, in preparing an establishment, of which the end is the defence of all the nation, we must not begin with a system which is only adapted to a peace; an assumption of this kind would render any military system nugatory. To form a system complete, it must be founded in its very nature on the supposition of an actual war. This would no doubt be reversing the present order of things; since it is not to be concealed, that as it is at present constituted, the war department is utterly incompetent to conduct a war; but such as would leave the mind of a general officer, in case of actual war, to labor under a most hazardous and perplexing responsibility. Possibly economy may here take the alarm, we shall quiet this costly chimera.

A peace establishment of the military department we conceive should be treated as the incident; forming and fixing the principles of the institution would not necessarily call for its immediate completion, or the appointment even of a single officer, or the expenditure of a single dollar more than at present; the duties and functions should be defined, but no additional officers employed until occasion called for them, that is war. It is necessary to offer these precautionary ideas to prevent misapprehension, and lest the idea of the formation of a system, that is a coherent and comprehensive regulation for the military department, should be mistaken for a wish to immediately organize an army and staff, and put them into pay. It is barely meant that during peace provision should be made against war, which we do not know how soon we may be involved in.....we shall therefore proceed.

The military system may be said to consist of two principal branches, military operations, and subsistence, both of which must be within the full and ample command of the chief of an army. These two branches become the objects of duty distributed among the staff; which unfolds another important truth, that every officer who has the provision, or charge of procuring supplies of subsistence or clothing, should be responsible in a military manner for the execution of his duty, and liable to military penalties for the abuse or the neglect of that duty. This is a most important consideration; and it is apprehended the scandalous state of the clothing of the army of the U. States, which has been gradually becoming worse for several years past, is a strong exemplification of this necessity. There should not be a single officer of the war department, unless perhaps the accounting officers, who should be exempt from military control, in order to assure a due exercise of their duty between the public and the military establishment; as it would be in the power of men intrusted with the provision of clothing or subsistence at any time.... to betray the army to an enemy.

The beginning should be with the organization of the general staff, and this should be adapted, for the reasons given, to a state of war. The secretary of the war department being in fact the chief of the staff, the rest of the staff should consist of an able practical general officer, a capable chief officer of the artillery, an effective chief officer of the engineers, a vigilant and experienced quarter-master general, and an intelligent and experienced adjutant general, with one or two commissioned officers, as the service might require, attached to each of these several officers as aids, who should execute under a board of war the details of duty; these superior officers, with others called in, should constitute this council or board for the regulation of all the military details; appoint inspectors of reviews; and such other persons as might be required to aid in the service, such as surgeons, draftsmen, &c. They should divide their duties into the military and the administrative, and have cognizance and control over every branch, always subject to the chief of the staff or secretary at war; they should assemble and deliberate, and their consultations and measures, however minute, with their reasonings or objections, should be daily recorded; and these consultations should, whenever required, be presented to the secretary at war, to the president, or to congress when called for.

The military branch should be distributed under the heads following.....

MILITARY I.....PLANS AND MEANS OF DEFENSIVE OR OFFENSIVE WAR.

1. This should comprehend a topographical establishment; the preparation of complete maps and surveys of our own country; and a classification of the surface of the Union into districts of equal portions of three, five, or nine parts; and these again into lesser districts; designating all the passes, roads, rivers, &c., in each, with descriptive memoirs and references to each.
2. The police of armies.
3. Military exercises or discipline.
4. Military operations, marchings, and encampments.
5. Movements of troops by water.
6. Military chronology, or daily and other returns, of duties, actions, retreats, &c. &c.

FISCAL II.....Subsistence, pecuniary and civil administration.

1. Pay, receipts, and expenditures, or the treasury branch.
2. Clothing, equipments, arms.
3. Provisions, meat, bread, grain, liquors, fuel.
4. Forage, hay, oats, straw, corn.
5. Hospitals and magazines.
6. Carriages and horses for stores and artillery.

Such is the outline of a military system adapted to the circumstances and necessities of the U. States. On a superficial glance, to timid or unreflecting men, this may appear to be surrounded with difficulties insuperable; there will be discordant opinions, envy, jealousy, folly will devise objections; no two men may concur, however equal and able; the objects are themselves too numerous and complex for any one man to prepare in time or in a satisfactory manner; the proposition itself will be said to arise from interested motives; from some lust of place or profit; it will require resolution to resist prejudice; and the requisite firmness to decide may not be found.

We shall close this part of our essay by stating generally, that whenever there shall appear a disposition to adopt this or any such system, means can be pointed out by which the insuperable difficulties shall be made appear easy to be overcome; discordant opinions reconciled and brought spontaneously to concurrence; envy, folly, and jealousy will be allowed to prey upon themselves, without danger of annoyance to the plan; the variety of the objects can be made subservient to render them more simple, practicable, and effective; and instead of the merit being ascribed to any one man, every officer in the army and the militia if they choose shall have an opportunity of laying his claim to a participation in the plan.

If the observations thrown out in this preface are well founded, the necessity of a work of this kind will be immediately perceived. Let it not however be imagined, says major James, that a Military Dictionary ought exclusively to belong to a camp or barrack, or be found in the closets or libraries of military men alone. The arts and sciences are so intimately connected together, that they eventually borrow language and resources from each other, and go hand in hand from the senate to the field, from the pulpit to the bar, and from the desk of the historian to the bureau of the statesman or politician.

We have a few words to say on certain parts of the work. The French phrases are adopted for their usefulness in reading, and often even in political reading: the words and phrases in the language of the East Indies, are adopted from the English Dictionary, in which however there were some errors which the editor of this work was enabled to correct, and to give more accurate explanations to many. Some subjects which might with more propriety be placed under one letter are placed under another; the course of reading which the editor commenced cotemporaneous with the preparation of the three first letters, not affording the illustrations until the letter to which they properly belonged had been printed. Thus under Valor will be found much of what would properly come under Courage; and under Topographical what would properly belong to Depot. There are several similar instances.

Should the disposition be manifested to cultivate the knowlege of military subjects generally, the editor proposes at some future day to publish gen. Grimoard’s treatise on the Staff of armies; the French Regulations for Cavalry of 1808; and the most modern and celebrated works on Tactics, the treatise of Jomini, the 4th volume of which was published in the beginning of 1810. All these works are already translated and ready to be put to press; beside a Dictionary of all the military actions recorded in ancient and modern history which is now in great forwardness.

Military men who may be desirous of adding to the stock of useful and correct knowlege, will oblige by pointing out any defects or errors, or recommending any additions that are pertinent to the nature of this work, addressed to the compiler.

July 4, 1810.

MILITARY
DICTIONARY.

A.

ABATIS, in a military sense, is formed by cutting down many entire trees, the branches of which are turned towards an enemy, and as much as possible entangled one into another. They are made either before redoubts, or other works, to render the attacks difficult, or sometimes along the skirts of a wood, to prevent an enemy from getting possession of it. In this case the trunks serve as a breast-work, behind which the troops are posted, and for that reason should be so disposed, that the parts may, if possible, flank each other.

ABLECTI, in military antiquity, a choice or select part of the soldiery in the Roman armies, picked out of those called extraordinarii.

ABOLLA, in military antiquity, a warm kind of garment, generally lined or doubled, used both by the Greeks and Romans, chiefly out of the city, in following the camp.

ABORD, Fr. attack, onset.

S’ABOUCHER, Fr. to parley.

ABOUT, a technical word to express the movement, by which a body of troops changes its front or aspect, by facing according to any given word of command.

Right About, is when the soldier completely changes the situation of his person, by a semi-circular movement to the right.

Left About, is when the soldier changes the situation of his person by a semi-circular movement to the left.

ABREAST, a term formerly used to express any number of men in front. At present they are determined by Files.

ABRI, Fr. shelter, cover. Etre à l’abri, to be under cover, as of a wood, hillock, &c.

ABSCISSA, in military mathematics, signifies any part of the diameter or axis of a curve, contained between its vertex or some other fixed point, and the intersection of the ordinate.

In the parabola, the abscissa is a third proportional to the parameter and the ordinate.

In the ellipsis, the square of the ordinate is equal to the rectangle under the parameter and abscissa, lessened by another rectangle under the said abscissa, and a fourth proportional to the axis, the parameter, and the abscissa.

In the hyperbola, the squares of the ordinates are as the rectangles of the abscissa by another line, compounded of the abscissa and the transverse axis.

But it must be remembered, that the two proportions relating to the ellipsis and hyperbola, the origin of the abscissas, or point from whence they began to be reckoned, is supposed to be the vertex of the curve, or, which amounts to the same thing, the point where the axis meets it; for if the origin of the abscissa be taken from the centre, as is often done, the above proportions will not be true.

ABSENT, a term used in military returns. It forms a part of regimental reports, to account for the deficiency of any given number of officers or soldiers; and is usually distinguished under two principal heads, viz.

Absent with leave, officers with permission, or non-commissioned officers and soldiers on furlough.

Absent without leave. Men who desert are frequently reported absent without leave, for the specific purpose of bringing their crime under regimental cognizance, and to prevent them from being tried capitally, for desertion.

ABSOLUTE Gravity, in philosophy, is the whole force by which a body, shell, or shot, is impelled towards the centre. See [Gravity].

Absolute Number, in Algebra, is the known quantity which possesses entirely one side of the equation. Thus, in the equation, xx + 10x, = 64, the number 64, possessing entirely one side of the equation, is called the absolute number, and is equal to the square of the unknown root x, added to 10x, or to 10 times x.

ABUTMENT. See [Bridges].

ACADEMY, in antiquity, the name of a villa situated about a mile from the city of Athens, where Plato and his followers assembled for conversing on philosophical subjects; and hence they acquired the name of Academics.

The term Academy is frequently used among the moderns for a society, of learned persons, instituted for the cultivation and improvement of arts or sciences. Some authors confound academy with university; but, though much the same in Latin, they are very different things in English. An university is, properly, a body composed of graduates in the several faculties; of professors, who teach in the public schools; of regents or tutors, and students who learn under them, and aspire likewise to degrees; whereas an academy was originally not intended for teaching, or to profess any art, but to improve it; it was not for novices to be instructed in, but for those who were more knowing; for persons of distinguished abilities to confer in, and communicate their lights and discoveries to each other, for their mutual benefit and improvement. The first academy we read of, was established by Charlemagne, by the advice of Alcuin: it was composed of the chief wits of the court, the emperor himself being a member.

Military Academy. There are in England two royal military academies, one at Woolwich, and one at Portsmouth. The first was established by king George II. in 1741, endowed, and supported, for the instructing of the people belonging to the military branch of ordnance, in the several parts of mathematics necessary to qualify them for the service of the artillery, and the business of engineers. The lectures of the masters in theory were then duly attended by the practitioner-engineers, officers, serjeants, corporals, private men, and cadets. At present the gentlemen educated at this academy are the sons of the nobility and military officers. They are called gentlemen cadets, and are not admitted under 14 and not above 16 years of age. They are taught writing, arithmetic, algebra, Latin, French, mathematics, mechanics, surveying, levelling, and fortification, together with the attack and defence; gunnery, mining, laboratory works, geography, perspective, fencing, dancing, &c. The master-general of the ordnance is always captain of the company of gentlemen cadets, and some officer of merit is always captain-lieutenant. There is, besides, a first lieutenant, and two second lieutenants. They are further under the immediate care of a lieutenant-governor, and an inspector, who are officers of great abilities and experience; and the professors and masters are men of known talents and capacity. That at Portsmouth was founded by George I. in 1722, for teaching of the branches of the mathematics which more immediately relate to navigation.

For the American and French Military Academies, see [School].

ACANZI, in military history, the name of the Turkish light-horse that form the van-guard of the Grand Signior’s army on a march.

ACCELERATED Motion on oblique or inclined-planes. See [Motion].

Accelerated Motion of pendulums. See [Pendulums].

Accelerated Motion of Projectiles. See [Projectiles].

ACCENDONES, in military antiquity, a kind of gladiators, or supernumeraries, whose office was to excite and animate the combatants during the engagement.

ACCENSI, in antiquity, were officers attending the Roman magistrates; their business was to summon the people to the public games, and to assist the prætor when he sat on the bench.

Accensi, in military antiquity, was also an appellation given to a kind of adjutants appointed by the tribune to assist each centurion and decurion. According to Festus, they were supernumerary soldiers, whose duty it was to attend their leaders, and supply the places of those who were either killed or wounded. Livy mentions them as irregular troops, but little esteemed. Salmasius says, they were taken out of the fifth class of the poor citizens of Rome.

ACCESSIBLE, that which may be approached. We say, in a military stile, that place, or that fortress, is accessible from the sea, or land, i. e. it may be entered on those sides.

An accessible height or distance, in geometry, is that which may be measured by applying a rule, &c. to it: or rather, it is a height, the foot whereof may be approached, and from whence any distance may be measured on the ground.

Heights, both accessible, and inaccessible, may be taken with a quadrant. See [Altitude]; and the article on Field Fortifications in the American Military Library, Theorem 11, 12, 13, 14, 15.

One of the objects of surveying, is the measuring both accessible and inaccessible distances.

ACCLIVITY, in a military sense, is the steepness or slope of any work, inclined to the horizon, reckoned upwards. Some writers on fortification use acclivity as synonymous with talus; though talus is commonly used to denote all manner of slopes, either in its ascendent or descendent state.

ACCONTIUM, in ancient military writers, a kind of Grecian dart or javelin, somewhat resembling the Roman pilum.

ACCOUTREMENTS, in a military sense, signify habits, equipage, or furniture, of a soldier, such as belts, pouches, cartridge-boxes, saddles, bridles, &c. Accoutrements should be made of stout leather, not of the spongy kind, which is always stretching, and difficult to clean. The belts are about 2¹⁄₄ inches broad, with two buckles to fix them to the pouch. Pouches are made of the stoutest blackened leather, especially the outside flaps, which are of such a substance as to turn the severest rain. Cartridge-boxes are made as light as possible, with holes in each, to hold cartridges. See [Cartridge].

ACLIDES, in Roman antiquity, a kind of missive weapon, with a thong fixed to it, whereby it might be drawn back again. Most authors describe the aclides as a sort of dart or javelin: but Scaliger makes it roundish or globular, with a wooden stem to poise it by.

ACOLUTHI, in military antiquity, was a title in the Grecian empire, given to the captain or commander of the varangi, or body-guards, appointed for the security of the emperor’s palace.

ACTIAN games in antiquity, were games instituted, or at least restored, by Augustus, in memory of the famous victory, at Actium, over Mark Antony.

Actian years, in chronology, a series of years, commencing with the epocha of the battle of Actium, otherwise called the æra of Augustus.

ACTION, in the military art, is an engagement between two armies, or any smaller body of troops, or between different bodies belonging thereto. The word is likewise used to signify some memorable act done by an officer, soldier, detachment or party.

ACTIVITY, in a military sense, denotes laboriousness, attention, labor, diligence and study.

ACUTE angle. See [Angle].

ADACTED applies to stakes, or piles, driven into the earth by large malls shod with iron, as in securing ramparts or pontoons.

ADDICE, a sort of axe which cuts horizontally. It is sometimes called an Adze.

ADIT, a passage under ground, by which miners approach the part they intend to sap. See [Gallery].

ADJUTANT-GENERAL is a staff officer, who aids and assists a general in his laborious duties: he forms the several details of duty of the army, with the brigade-majors, and keeps an exact state of each brigade and regiment, with a roll of the lieutenant-generals, major-generals, colonels, lieutenant-colonels, and majors. He every day at head quarters receives orders from the general officer of the day, and distributes them to the majors of brigades, from whom he receives the number of men they are to furnish for the duty of the army, and informs them of any detail which may concern them. On marching days he accompanies the general to the ground of the camp. He makes a daily report of the situation of all the posts placed for the safety of the army, and of any changes made in their posts. In a day of battle he acts as aid to the general. In a siege he visits the several posts and guards of the trenches, and reports their situation, and how circumstanced: he gives and signs all orders for skirmishing parties (if time permit) and has a serjeant from each brigade to carry any orders which he may have to send. See American Mil. Lib. Article Staff.

ADJUTANT, an officer who aids the major in part of his duty, and performs it in his absence. He receives orders from the brigade-major, if in camp; and when in garrison, from the town-major: after he has carried them to his colonel or officer commanding the regiment, he then assembles the serjeant-major, drum-major and fife-major, with a serjeant and corporal of each company, who write the orders in an orderly book, to shew to their respective officers. If convoys, parties, detachments, or guards, are to be furnished, he gives the number which each company is to furnish, and hour and place for the assembling: he must keep an exact roster and roll of duties, and have a perfect knowlege of all manœuvres, &c. This post is usually given to an active subaltern.

ADMIRAL, on the European establishiments, when on shore, are entitled to receive military honors, and rank with generals in the army.

ADVANCE. See [Pay] in Advance.

ADVANCED signifies some part of an army in front of the rest, as in advanced guards, which always precede the line of march or operations of a body of troops; again, as when a battalion, or guns of a second line are brought up in front and before the first line. This term also applies to the promotions of officers and soldiers.

ADVANCEMENT, in a military sense, signifies honor, promotion, or preferment, in the army, regiment or company.

ADVANTAGE Ground, a ground that gives superiority, or an opportunity of annoyance or resistance.

ADVICE-Boat, a vessel employed for intelligence.

ADVOCATE General. See [Judge Martial].

ÆNEATORES, in military antiquity, the musicians in an army; including those who sounded the trumpets, horns, litui, buccincæ, &c.

AFFAIR, in the military acceptation of the word, means any slight action or engagement.

Affair of Honor, a duel.

AFFAMER, une Place, Fr. to besiege a place so closely as to starve the garrison and inhabitants. See [Blockade].

AFFIDAVIT, in military law, signifies an oath taken before some person who is properly authorised to administer it; as first, when a soldier is inlisted, when it is stiled an attestation; secondly, by all officers appointed on a court-martial; thirdly, by the commissaries, or muster-masters.

AFFRONTER, Fr. to encounter or attack boldly.

AFFUT, the French name for a gun-carriage, and for which we have no appropriate name; the only distinction from all other carriages is, that it belongs to a gun. See [Carriage].

AGA, in the Turkish army, is the same as a general with us.

AGE. A young man must be 14 years old before he can become an officer in the English army, or be entered as a cadet at Woolwich, in the English academy.

Persons are enlisted for soldiers from 17 to 45. After the latter age, every inhabitant is exempted from serving in the British militia.

By a late regulation in England, growing boys may be enlisted under 16 years of age. These recruits are chiefly intended for the East-India service.

In the United States 18 to 45 is the legal age for militia and regulars.

The Romans were obliged to enter themselves in the army at the age of 17 years; at 45 they might demand their dismission. Amongst the Lombards, the age of entry was between 18 and 19; among the Saxons, at 13.

AGEMA, in the ancient military art, a kind of soldiery chiefly in the Macedonian armies. The word is Greek, and literally denotes vehemence, to express the strength and eagerness of this corps. Some authors will have agema to denote a certain number of picked men, answering to a legion among the Romans.

AGENCY, a certain proportion of money which is ordered to be subtracted from the pay and allowances of the British army, for transacting the business of the several regiments composing it.

AGENT, a person in the civil department of the British army, between the paymaster-general and the paymaster of the regiment, through whom every regimental concern of a pecuniary nature must be transacted. He gives security to government for all monies which pass through his hands in the capacity of an Agent—and by the Mutiny Act, it was provided, That if an Agent shall withhold the Pay of Officers or Soldiers for the Space of one Month, he should be dismissed from his Office and forfeit 100l.

The army agency has since been incorporated with the British war office, and forms a special department.

Military Agent in the United States is a civil officer whose duty is the transporting of clothing and other articles; and the expenditures for other services attached to the military department; they act under direct orders from the War Department.

AGGER, in ancient military writers, denotes the middle part of a military road, raised into a ridge, with a gentle slope on each side, to make a drain for the water, and keep the way dry.

Agger is also used for the whole road, or military way. Where highways were to be made in low grounds, as between two hills, the Romans used to raise them above the adjacent land, so as to make them of a level with the hills. These banks they called aggeres. Bergier mentions several in the Gallia Belgica, which were thus raised 10, 15, or 20 feet above ground, and 5 or 6 leagues long. They are sometimes called aggeres calceati, or causeways.

Agger, also, denotes a work of fortification, used both for the defence and the attack of towns, camps, &c. in which sense agger is the same with what was otherwise called vallum, and in later times, agestum: and among the moderns, lines; sometimes, cavaliers, terrasses, &c.

The agger was usually a bank, or elevation of earth, or other matter, bound and supported with timber; having sometimes turrets on the top, wherein the workmen, engineers, and soldiery, were placed. It had also a ditch, which served as its chief defence. The height of the agger was frequently equal to that of the wall of the place. Cæsar tells us of one he made, which was 30 feet high, and 330 feet broad. Besides the use of aggers before towns, they generally used to fortify their camps with them; for want of which precaution, divers armies have been surprised and ruined.

There were vast aggers made in towns and places on the sea-side, fortified with towers, castles, &c. Those made by Cæsar and Pompey, at Brundusium, are famous. Sometimes aggers were even built across arms of the sea, lakes, and morasses; as was done by Alexander before Tyre, and by M. Antony and Cassius.

The wall of Severus, in the north of England, may be considered as a grand agger, to which belong several lesser ones. Besides, the principal agger or vallum, on the brink of the ditch, Mr. Horsley describes another on the south side of the former, about 5 paces distant from it, which he calls the south agger; and another larger one, on the north side of the ditch, called the north agger. This latter he conjectures to have served as a military way; the former, probably, was made for the inner defence, in case the enemy should beat them from any part of the principal vallum, or to protect the soldiers against any sudden attack from the provincial Britons.

Agger Tarquinii, was a famous fence built by Tarquinius Superbus, on the east side of Rome, to stop the incursions of the Latins, and other enemies, whereby the city might be invested.

Agger is also used for the earth dug out of a ditch or trench, and thrown up on the brink of it: in which sense, the Chevalier Folard thinks the word to be understood, when used in the plural number, since we can hardly suppose they would raise a number of cavaliers, or terrasses.

Agger is also used for a bank or wall, erected against the sea, or some great river, to confine or keep it within bounds; in which sense, agger amounts to the same with what the ancients called tumulus and moles; the Dutch, dyke; and we, dam, sea-wall; the Asiatics call them bunds, &c.

AGIADES, in the Turkish armies, are a kind of pioneers, or rather field engineers, employed in fortifying the camp, &c.

AGUERRI, Fr. an officer or soldier experienced in war; a veteran.

AIDE-DE-CAMP, an officer appointed to attend a general officer, in the field, in winter-quarters, and in garrison; he receives and carries the orders, as occasion requires. He is taken from the line, and all aids-de-camp have extra pay allowed for their duty. This employment is of greater importance than has been generally believed: it has been, however, too often entrusted to young officers of little experience, and of as little capacity; but in the French service they bestow great attention on this article. Marshal de Puysegur mentions the loss of a battle through the incapacity of an aide-de-camp. On the English establishment, generals, being field marshals, have four, lieutenant-generals two, and major-generals and brigadier-generals one.

In the United States the number is established by law; though on service the number must necessarily be equal to the exigency, or the various points to which orders must be sent. See American Mil. Lib. Article Staff.

AIDE du Parc des Vivres, Fr. an officer in France, acting immediately under the commissary of stores and provisions.

AID-MAJOR. See [Adjutant].

AIGREMORE, a term used by the artificers in the laboratory, to express the charcoal in a state fitted for the making of powder.

AIGUILLE, an instrument used by engineers to pierce a rock for the lodgement of powder, as in a mine; or to mine a rock, so as to excavate and make roads.

AILE, Fr. a wing or flank of an army or fortification.

AIM, the act of bringing the musquet, piece of ordnance, or any other missive weapon, to its proper line of direction with the object intended to be struck.

AIM FRONTLET, a piece of wood hollowed out to fit the muzzle of a gun, to make it of an equal height with the breech, formerly made use of by the gunners, to level and direct their pieces. It is not used at present.

AIR-GUN, a pneumatic machine for exploding bullets, &c. with great violence.

The common air-gun is made of brass, and has two barrels: the inside barrel is of a small bore, from whence the bullets are exploded; and a large barrel on the outside of it. There is likewise a syringe fixed in the stock of the gun by which the air is injected into the cavity between the two barrels through a valve. The ball is put down into its place in the small barrel with the rammer, as in any other gun. Another valve, being opened by the trigger, permits the air to come behind the bullet, so as to drive it out with great force. If this valve be opened and shut suddenly, one charge of condensed air may be sufficient for several discharges of bullets; but if the whole air be discharged on one single bullet, it will drive it out with uncommon force. This discharge is effected by means of a lock placed here, as usual in other guns; for the trigger being pulled, the cock will go down and drive the lever, which will open the valve, and let in the air upon the bullet: but as the expansive power of the condensed air diminishes at each discharge, its force is not determined with sufficient precision for the purposes of war. Hence it has been long out of use among military men.

In the air-gun, and all other cases where the air is required to be condensed to a very great degree, it will be necessary to have the syringe of a small bore, viz. not exceeding half an inch in diameter; because the pressure against every square inch is about 15 pounds, and therefore against every circular inch about 12 pounds. If therefore the syringe be one inch in diameter, when the atmosphere is injected, there will be a resistance of 12 pounds against the piston; and when 10 are injected, there will be a force of 120 pounds to be overcome; whereas 10 atmospheres act against the circular half-inch piston (whose area is only ¹⁄₄ part so large) with only a force equal to 30 pounds; or 40 atmospheres may be injected with such a syringe, as well as 10 with the other. In short, the facility of working will be inversely as the squares of the diameter of the syringe.

AIR-SHAFTS, in mining. See [Mining].

ALARM, is a sudden apprehension upon some report, which makes men run to their arms to stand upon their guard; it implies either the apprehension of being suddenly attacked, or the notice given of such an attack being actually made; generally signified by the firing of a cannon, or rocket, the beat of a drum, &c.

Alarm-Post, in the field, is the ground appointed by the quarter-master general for each regiment to march to, in case of an alarm.

Alarm-Post, in a garrison, is the place allotted by the governor for the troops to draw up in, on any sudden alarm.

False-Alarms, are stratagems of war, frequently made use of to harrass an enemy, by keeping them perpetually under arms. They are often conveyed by false reports, occasioned by a fearful or negligent sentinel. A vigilant officer will sometimes make a false alarm, to try if his guards are strict upon duty.

Alarm Bell, the bell rung upon any sudden emergency, as a fire, mutiny, approach of an enemy, or the like, called by the French, Tocsin.

ALCANTARA, knights of a Spanish military order, who gained a great name during the wars with the Moors.

ALERT, originally derived from the French word alerte, which is formed of a and airte. The French formerly said airte for air; so that alerte means something continually in the air, and always ready to be put in action. A general is said to be alert when he is particularly vigilant.

To be kept upon the alert, is to be in continual apprehension of being surprised. Alerte, among the French, is an expression which is used to put soldiers upon their guard. It is likewise used by a post that may be attacked in the night, to give notice to the one that is destined to support it; and by a sentry to give warning when any part of the enemy is approaching. We have had an alert, is a military phrase.

ALGEBRA, a peculiar kind of arithmetic, in which every military man ought to be versed, but which is indispensibly necessary for officers in the ordnance department.

ALIEN, in law, implies a person born in a foreign country, in contradistinction to a natural born or naturalized person.

ALIGNEMENT, implies any thing strait—For instance, the alignement of a battalion means the situation of a body of men when drawn up in line. The alignement of a camp signifies the relative position of the tents, &c. so as to form a strait line, from given points.

ALLAY. See [Alloy].

ALLÆ, in the ancient military art, the two wings or extremes of an army ranged in order of battle.

ALLEGIANCE, in law, implies the obedience which is due to the laws.

Oath of Allegiance, is that taken by an alien, by which he adopts America and renounces the authority of a foreign government. It is also applied to the oath taken by officers and soldiers in pledge of their fidelity to the state.

ALLEGIANT, loyal, faithful to the laws.

ALLEZER, to cleanse the mouth of a cannon or other piece of ordnance, and to increase the bore, so as to produce its determined calibre.

ALLEZOIR, a frame of timber firmly suspended in the air with strong cordage, on which is placed a piece of ordnance with the muzzle downwards. In this situation the bore is rounded and enlarged by means of an instrument which has a very sharp and strong edge made to traverse the bore by the force of machinery or horses, and in an horizontal direction.

ALLEZURES, the metal taken from the cannon by boring.

ALLIAGE, a term used by the French to denote the composition of metals used for the fabrication of cannon and mortars, &c.

ALLIANCE, in a military sense, signifies a treaty entered into by sovereign states, for their mutual safety and defence. In this sense alliances may be divided into such as are offensive, where the contracting parties oblige themselves jointly to attack some other power; and into such as are defensive, whereby the contracting powers bind themselves to stand by, and defend one another, in case of being attacked by any other power.

Alliances are variously distinguished, according to their object, the parties in them, &c. Hence we read of equal, unequal, triple, quadruple, grand, offensive, defensive alliances, &c.

ALLODIAL, independent; not feudal. The Allodii of the Romans were bodies of men embodied on any emergency, in a manner similar to our volunteer associations.

ALLOGNE, the cordage used with floating bridges, by which they are guided from one side of a river to the other.

ALLONGE, Fr. a pass or thrust with a rapier or small sword; also a long rein used in the exercising of horses.

ALLOY, is the mixture of metals that enter into the composition of the metal proper for cannon and mortars.

ALLY, in a military sense, implies any nation united to another—under a treaty, either offensive or defensive, or both.

ALMADIE, a kind of military canoe, or small vessel, about 24 feet long, made of the bark of a tree, and used by the negroes of Africa.

Almadie, is also the name of a long-boat used at Calcutta, often 80 to 100 feet long, and generally six or seven broad, they row from ten to thirty oars.

ALTIMETRY, the taking or measuring altitude, or heights.

ALTITUDE, height, or distance from the ground, measured upwards, and may be both accessible, and inaccessible.

Altitude of a figure, is the distance of its vertex from its base, or the length of a perpendicular let fall from the vertex to the base. See American Mil. Lib. Art. Field Fortification.

Altitude of a shot or shell, is the perpendicular height of the vertex above the horizon. See [Gunnery] and [Projectiles].

Altitude, in optics, is usually considered as the angle subtended between a line drawn through the eye, parallel to the horizon, and a visual ray emitted from an object to the eye.

Altitude, in cosmography, is the perpendicular height of an object, or its distance from the horizon upwards.

Altitudes are divided into accessible and inaccessible.

Accessible Altitude of an object, is that whose base you can have access to, i. e. measure the nearest distance between your station and the foot of the object on the ground.

Inaccessible Altitude of an object, is that when the foot or bottom of it cannot be approached, by reason of some impediment; such as water, or the like. The instruments chiefly used in measuring of altitudes, are the quadrant, theodolite, geometric quadrant, cross, or line of shadows, &c.

Altitude of the eye, in perspective, is a right line let fall from the eye, perpendicular to the geometrical plane.

Altitude of motion, a term used by some writers, to express the measure of any motion, computed according to the line of direction of the moving force.

AMAZON, one of those women who are fabled to have composed a nation of themselves, exclusive of males, and to have derived their name from their cutting off one of their breasts, that it might not hinder or impede the exercise of their arms. This term has often by modern writers been used to signify a bold daring woman, whom the delicacy of her sex does not hinder from engaging in the most hazardous attempts. The recent and former wars with France have furnished several instances of females who have undergone the fatigue of a campaign with alacrity, and run the hazards of a battle with the greatest intrepidity. Several cases occurred also in the American Revolution.

AMBIT, the compass or circuit of any work or place, as of a fortification or encampment, &c.

AMBITION, in a military sense, signifies a desire of greater posts, or honors. Every person in the army or navy, ought to have a spirit of emulation to arrive at the very summit of the profession by his personal merit.

AMBUSCADE, in military affairs, implies a body of men posted in some secret or concealed place, ’till they find an opportunity of falling upon the enemy by surprise; or, it is rather a snare set for the enemy, either to surprise him when marching without precaution; or by posting your force advantageously, and drawing him on by different stratagems, to attack him with superior means. An ambuscade is easily carried into execution in woods, buildings, and hollow places; but requires a more fertile imagination, and greater trouble, in a level country.

AMBUSH, a place of concealment for soldiers to surprise an enemy, by falling suddenly upon him.

AME, a French term, similar in its import to the word chamber, as applied to cannon, &c.

AMENDE honorable, in the old armies of France, signified an apology for some injury done to another, or satisfaction given for an offence committed against the rules of honor or military etiquette; and was also applied to an infamous kind of punishment inflicted upon traitors, parricides, or sacrilegious persons, in the following manner: the offender being delivered into the hands of the hangman, his shirt stripped off, a rope put about his neck, and a taper in his hand; then he was led into court, where he begged pardon of God, the court, and his country. Sometimes the punishment ended there; but sometimes it was only a prelude to death, or banishment to the gallies. It prevails yet in some parts of Europe.

AMMUNITION, implies all sorts of powder and ball, shells, bullets, cartridges, grape-shot, tin, and case-shot; carcasses, granades, &c.

Ammunition, or gun-powder, may be prohibited to be exported.

Ammunition, for small arms, in the British service, is generally packed in half barrels, each containing 1000 musket, or 1500 carbine cartridges. An ammunition waggon will carry 20 of these barrels, and an ammunition cart 12 of them: their weight nearly 1 cwt. each.

The cartouch boxes of the infantry are made of so many different shapes and sizes, that it is impossible to say exactly what ammunition they will contain; but most of them can carry 60 rounds. See the word [Cartridges]; and for artillery ammunition, see the word [Artillery], for the field, for the siege, and the defence of a fortified place.

The French pack all their ammunition in waggons without either boxes or barrels, by means of partitions of wood. Their 12 Pr. and 8 Pr. waggons will contain each 14,000 musket cartridges, but their 4 Pr. waggons will contain only 12,000 each.

Ammunition bread, such as is contracted for by government, and served in camp, garrison, and barracks.

Ammunition shoes, stockings, shirts, stacks, &c. such of those articles as are served out to the private soldiers, by government. See [Half-Mountings].

Ammunition waggon, is generally a four-wheel carriage with shafts; the sides are railed in with staves and raves, and lined with wicker-work, so as to carry bread and all sorts of tools. It is drawn by four horses, and loaded with 1200 pound weight. See [Waggon].

Ammunition-cart, a two-wheel carriage with shafts; the sides of which, as well as the fore and hind parts, are inclosed with boards instead of wicker-work. See [Caisson].

AMMUZETTE. See the word [Guns].

AMNESTY, in a military or political sense, is an act by which two belligerent powers at variance promise to forget and bury in oblivion all that is past.

Amnesty is either general and unlimited, or particular and restrained, though most commonly universal, without conditions or exceptions: such as that which passed in Germany at the peace of Osnaburg in the year 1648, and between the United States and Great Britain, in 1783.

Amnesty, in a more limited sense, denotes a pardon to persons rebellious, usually with some exceptions; such as was granted by Charles II. at his restoration.

AMNISTIE, Fr. See [Amnesty].

AMORCE, an old military word for fine-grained powder, such as is sometimes used for the priming of great guns, mortars or howitzers; as also for small-arms, on account of its rapid inflammation. A port fire, or quick match.

AMPLITUDE of the range of a projectile. See [Projectile].

AMPOULETTE, an old military term used by the French to express the stock of a musket, &c.

AMUSETTE, a species of offensive weapon which was invented by the celebrated Marshal Saxe. It is fired off in the same manner as a musquet, but is mounted nearly like a cannon. It has been found of considerable use during the war of the French revolution, especially among the French, who armed some of their horse artillery with it, and found it superior to the one adopted by the Prussians from Marshal Saxe.

ANABASII, in antiquity, were expeditious couriers, who carried dispatches of great importance, in the Roman wars.

ANACLETICUM, in the ancient art of war, a particular blast of the trumpet, whereby the fearful and flying soldiers were rallied and recalled to the combat.

ANCIENT, a term, used formerly to express the grand ensign or standard of an army.

ANCILE, in antiquity, a kind of shield, which fell, as was pretended, from heaven, in the reign of Numa Pompilius; at which time, likewise, a voice was heard, declaring, that Rome would be mistress of the world as long as she should preserve this holy buckler.

Authors are much divided about its shape: however, it was kept with great care in the temple of Mars, under the direction of twelve priests; and lest any should attempt to steal it, eleven others were made so like it, as not to be distinguished from the sacred one. These Ancilia were carried in procession every year round the city of Rome.

ANDABATÆ, in military antiquity, a kind of gladiators, who fought hoodwinked; having a sort of helmet that covered the eyes and face. They fought mounted on horse-back, or on chariots.

St. ANDREW, or the Thistle, a nominally military order of knighthood in Scotland. The occasion of instituting this order is variously related.

In 819, Achaius, king of Scotland, having formed a league, offensive and defensive, with Charlemagne, against all other princes, found himself thereby so strong, that he took for his device the Thistle and the Rue, which he composed into a collar of his order, and for his motto, Pour ma defense; intimating thereby, that he feared not the powers of foreign princes, seeing he leaned on the succour and alliance of the French. And though from hence may be inferred, that these two plants, the Thistle and the Rue, were the united symbols of one order of knighthood, yet Menenius divides them into two; making one whose badge was the thistle, whence the knights were so called; and the motto, Nemo me impune lacessit; another vulgarly called Sertum rutæ, or the garland of rue; the collar of which was composed of two branches or sprigs thereof, or else of several of its leaves: at both these collars hung one and the same jewel, to wit, the figure of St Andrew, bearing before him the cross of his martyrdom.

But though the thistle has been acknowleged for the badge and symbol of the kingdom of Scotland, even from the reign of Achaius, as the rose was of England, and the lily of France, the pomegranate of Spain, &c.; yet there are some who refer the order of the thistle to later times, in the reign of Charles VII. of France; when the league of amity was renewed between that kingdom and Scotland, by which the former received great succour from the latter, at a period of extraordinary distress. Others again place the foundation still later, even as low as the year 1500; but without any degree of certainty.

The chief and principal ensign of this order is a gold collar, composed of thistles, interlinked with annulets of gold, having pendent thereto the image of St Andrew with his cross, and this motto, Nemo me impune lacessit.

Knights of St. Andrew, is also a nominal military order instituted by Peter III. of Muscovy, in 1698; the badge of which is a golden medal, on one side whereof is represented St. Andrew’s cross; and on the other are these words, Czar Pierre monarque de toute la Russie. This medal, being fastened to a blue ribbon, is suspended from the right shoulder.

ANGARIA, in ancient military writers, means a guard of soldiers posted in any place for the security of it. Vide Vegetius, lib. i. c. 3. lib. ii. c. 19. lib. iii. c. 8.

Angaria, in civil law, implies a service by compulsion, as furnishing horses and carriages for conveying corn or other stores for the army.

ANGE, a term used by the French to express chain shot.

ANGEL Shot. See [Chain-Shot].

ANGLE, in geometry, is the inclination of two lines meeting one another in a point.

Sometimes angles are denoted by a single letter placed at the point of intersection; but when several lines meet at the same point, each particular angle is denoted by three letters, whereof the middle letter shews the angular point, and the other two letters the lines which form that angle.

The measure of an angle is the arch of a circle, described on the angular point, intercepted between the two lines which form the angle, and as many degrees, &c. as are contained in that arch, so many degrees, &c. the angle is said to consist of.

Angles are either right, acute, or obtuse.

A Right Angle, is that whose two legs are perpendicular to each other; and consequently the arch intercepted between them is exactly 90° or the quarter of a circle.

An Acute Angle, is that which is less than a right angle, or 90°.

An Obtuse Angle, is that which is greater than a right angle.

Adjacent Angles, are such as have the same vertex, and one common side contained beyond the angular point. The sum of the adjacent angles is always equal to two right angles (13. Eucl. 1.) and therefore, if one of them be acute, the other will be obtuse; and the contrary: whence, if either of them be given, the other is also given, it being the complement of the former to 180°.

Homologous Angles in similar figures are such as retain the same order, reckoning from the first in both figures.

Vertical Angles, are the opposite angles made by two lines cutting or crossing each other. When two lines cut or cross each other, the vertical angles are equal (15 Eucl. 1.)

Alternate Angles, are those cut or obtuse angles made by two lines cutting or crossing each other, and formed by a right line cutting or crossing two parallel lines. Alternate angles are always equal to each other (18. Eucl. 1.)

A rectilineal or right lined Angle, is made by strait lines, to distinguish it from the spherical or curvilineal angle.

Angles of contact. Angles of contact may be considered as true angles, and should be compared with one another, though not with right lined angles as being infinitely smaller.

Angle of elevation, in gunnery, is that which the axis of the hollow cylinder, or barrel of the gun, makes with a horizontal line. See [Elevation].

Angles oblique are those which are greater than right angles.

Spherical Angle, is an angle formed by the intersection of two great circles of the sphere. All spherical angles are measured by an arch of a great circle described on the vertex as a pole, and intercepted between the legs which form the angle.

Angle lunular is an angle formed by the intersection of two curves, the one concave and the other convex.

Mixed-line Angle, is that comprehended between a right line and a curved line.

Curved-line Angle, is that intercepted between two curved lines meeting each other in one point, in the same plane.

Angle of a semi-circle is that which the diameter of a circle makes with the circumference.

Angle of Incidence, is that which the line of direction of a ray of light, &c. makes at the point where it first touches the body it strikes against, with a line erected perpendicular to the surface of that body.

Angle of interval between two places is that formed by two lines directed from the eye to those places.

Angle of Reflection, is the angle intercepted between the line of direction of a body rebounding, after it has struck against another body, and a perpendicular erected at the point of contact.

Angle at the centre, in fortification, is the angle formed at the middle of the polygon, by lines drawn from thence to the points of the two adjacent bastions.

That which is made by, and contained between the curtain and the flank.

Angle of the polygon, that which is made by the meeting of the two sides of the polygon, or figure in the centre of the bastion. See [Fortification].

Angle of the triangle, is half the angle of the polygon.

That which is made by the two faces, being the utmost part of the bastion most exposed to the enemy’s batteries, frequently called the point of the bastion. See [Fortification].

Diminished Angle, only used by some engineers, especially the Dutch, is composed of the face of the bastion, and the exterior side of the polygon.

Is formed by one face, and one flank of the bastion. See [Fortification].

Is made by two lines fichant, that is, the faces of the two bastions extended till they meet in an angle towards the curtain, and is that which always carries its point towards the out-works. See [Fortification].