The Story of the British Army

by Charles Cooper King

Since the campaign of 1870 to 1871, greater attention has been paid to visual signalling by flag or flash, and the field telegraph is much more actively employed, and accompanies, as far as possible, the army up to the point of attack.

In England, considerable attention has been paid to night marching and night attacks, as being the only method under favourable circumstances of crossing, unseen, the fire-swept zone now so much more extended than formerly.

Balloons, captive and free, form part of the equipment of an army corps, and officers are trained both in their use and in reconnoitring from them. They were employed in the operations round Suakin, but are difficult to manage in windy weather, as they found on that occasion.

Uniform has altered little, but helmets were issued in 1877 to all but Highland and Fusilier Regiments; and since that date the Rifle headdress has been restored, as well as the peculiar shako of the Highland Light Infantry. Badge and rank chevrons were formerly worn by all light infantry regiments on both arms, but this was abandoned, though the old 43rd still wore them up to 1881.[72] The abolition of purchase in 1872 rendered the army possibly more professional, but certainly not, as was imagined, less expensive. It destroyed, however, the “right” claimed by officers who had purchased to different treatment from that which would naturally follow under a non-purchase system. Curiously enough, the alteration was hardest on the poor man who rose from the ranks, as he, on his retirement, frequently received a large sum for the “regulation” and “over regulation” price of his commission.

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But the two greatest changes have been the introduction of short service, and the territorialisation of the regiments of the army; both of which measures have opponents as well as friends.

There is much misconception about the former, certainly. Its enemies quite forget that there was practically no alternative, that we are living in the end of the nineteenth century, not the beginning. The so-called Long Service Act of 1847, with its ten years’ service for the first period with the colours, and the right, if of good character, to extend it to twenty-one years for pension, did not provide sufficient recruits for a meagre army, and, as the Crimea proved, gave not only an insufficient number of men, but no reserves at all. When peace was signed, we had boy soldiers in the ranks much as we have now, many of the older men having perished; yet they fought well, as they always have done. Outside the first line there were foreign legions and militia, and that was all. The times even then were past since an army of 25,000 men was considered a respectable command for a serious European war; and the change in the conditions is even greater now, with all Europe an armed camp, and the armies themselves counting as many thousands as they did hundreds “when George the Third was king.” Nor was the longer service Act of 1867 any better. It gave twelve years with the colours and nine of re-engaged time to obtain pension. But the army then was more under its proper strength annually than before.

The plain fact is, that an army of even the dimensions of our own cannot attract a sufficient number of recruits for so long a period as ten or twelve years. You can get enough men to do so for a force a few thousands strong, like the Royal Marine Corps, but not for an army which has to put in fifteen or sixteen years in such climates as some parts of India or Burmah.

Short service was inevitable, and since its introduction the army has rarely, I believe never, been below its numerical strength. The question of reserves, important as that is, and of good non-commissioned officers is quite beside the question. Neither would be worth a row of pins without a sufficient number of men, however young, in the ranks. Besides, if serious war comes, the same method will be adopted that was in vogue in the much-belauded long service days. Battalions were weeded then as they are now, and though they had permanently a larger proportion of older men in the ranks to stiffen the regiments, the same stiffening can always be got from the reserves whenever it is wanted. Our previous system gave us nothing, absolutely nothing, to fall back on; our present system gives us, if we want them, some 100,000 old soldiers whom we can claim as a right.

No one prefers boy soldiers to stout men. No one for choice would take very young men for sergeants. But if the State will not offer greater inducements, if the nation will not pay the cost, then you must do the best you can with the materials you can purchase in the open labour markets of this country.