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ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
B08601	War practically perform'd: shewing all the requisites belonging to a land-army, in marches, battels, and sieges. / Deduced from ancient and modern discipline by the experience of Capt. Nath. Boteler.	Boteler, Nathaniel.	1672 (1672)	Wing B6288D; ESTC R173344	93,172	256

are better able and provided to sustain the Enemies resistance at their landing then the Foot who must needs be much encumbred and tired by their wading thorow the water and especially if the Foord be broad or deep And besides the Horse thus marching in Front shall oportunely discover the condition of the passage where it is at best and worst and may also be ready to relieve and succour any of the Foot that by any accident may be endangered in the water And this was Caesars order in his British War in his passage over the River of Thames and at the River Sicoris in his Spanish War And if the Foord be deep and withal of a swift current it will be necessary to place a great number both of Horse and other great Cattle as well above the part where the Army is to Foord it as also below for hereby the Horse that stand above will break the force of the Current and the Horse that stand below may succour and take up any such as shall happen to be overswayed by the force of the stream and withal add courage to the Souldiers in general to adventure And this course was practised by Hannibal in a passage of his Army over the River Po where in stead of Horse his Elephants were thus ordered to this purpose A second course to this end but requiring more time though with less peril may be to abate the depth of the Foord and violence of the Current by dividing the River into many Chanels As Cyrus did the River Euphrates when he took Babylon from Baltazzer and Semiramis the same River if we credit Herodotus long before as afterwards Alexander Neither hath this practice been altogether amongst the Ancients for at the last siege of the Town of the Borse when the States took it in that small River that ran through the Town was so diverted that the Town was not only streightned in point of water but all such Passages and Avenues drowned as might have facilitated a Reliefe from abroad and the approaches upon the Town it self made by far more easie and accessible As for the kindes of Bridges proper for these conveyances of Armies over Rivers whereof we spake of one even now Of these there are many sorts but those most in use and indeed most commendable as are made upon flat-bottom Boats or Punts wheresoever these are to be procured But withal whatsoever the Bridges be or howsoever contrived it is to be received for a Maxime that whensoever an Army is to pass over any of them and the Enemie within the distance of half a days march no part of the Army ought to be severed from the main Body that no advantage may be taken by the Enemy to intercept or come between them and their Friends And this holds not onely in the passages by Bridges but by Boats or Foords or any other And thus you have directions for the marshalling of Armies in a march And these well observed though an Army should be forced to march even by night need no other additions save onely that extraordinary care be had in providing a sufficient number of able Guides which are to be distributed throughout the whole Army That a well chosen Watch-word be given whereby every Piece and individual Person may be known one to another That many Altes be made to hold all the parts together and no Stragglers lost That the quantity and length of the march be so laid and with that discretion limited that the Souldiers be neither disabled by over-long journeys nor oportunities lost by sickness and lastly that especial endeavour be practised to procure good intelligence of the Enemies proceedings As for such marches as are to be made over Mountains thorow Woods and Boggie and Marish grounds and the like it is not to be expected that any certainty can be prescribed as touching their forms for they are to be accommodated to the ground and ways that necessity throws them upon and commonly are extended in great lengths made passable by the labour of Pioneers but best secured by vigilancie CHAP. VIII Of the ordinary way of ordering a Royal Army to Battel The Leaders in this order where to place themselves and who to be A censure of the defects of this order formerly described Of the Generals placing himself betwixt the Battel and the Rear The best place for the General in a battel Of the lining of the Horse with the light-armed or Musqueteers Of the long-Bowe how to be ordered and employed wherein it is preferable and hath the advantage of the Musquet How the Horse are most advantagiously ordered and placed in a battel The best Forms and proportions of Horse-battels The censure upon these Forms and the use of them The depth that Horse-battels are to be ordered into Of some words of Command both to Horse and Foot Of doubling Files and Ranks and the use of them A modern form of ordering a Fight much approved of Why an Army is thus to be ordered Objections answered IN the last foregoing Chapter we propounded some directions how Armies were to march In this we shall speak of the forms of embattelling them to fight and shall purposely omit many sorts of them as being to little or no purpose save to express the cunning of a curious Serjeant-Major-General and to please wanton Spectators but shall apply my self to such as are most of use The customary way of ordering an Army-Royal to a Battel as well Anciently as more Modernly hath been to divide it into three Battaliaes or main Bodies and these three Bodies have been and yet are by some Nations ordered into one joint Phalanx by others distributed into maniples or small divisions Between which divisions for the prevention of some confusions they leave intervals or distances that by them and through them one Battel or Body may the more conveniently second the other And the breadth and depth of these maniples are to be made answerable to the Enemies forces and the nature of the ground but with such distances that if the Vant-guard should happen to be broken it may conveniently retreat thorow them behind the Battel which thereupon is to joyn and advance and so to renew the Front and receive the Enemy afresh And in the like manner upon the like occasion is the Battel to do behind the Rear And as the one Body is thus relieved by another so may one maniple by another and that without either the advancing or retire of the whole Body As for the Leaders of these several Bodies those of the Vant-guard are to be the Lord Marshal with the one half of the Colonels and half of the Captains having the best men in the Front And in a retreat the same men are to bring up that Rear The Leaders of the Battel and of the Rear are to be the other half of the Colonels and Captaius As for the Generalissimo's place according to this order it is to be between the Battel and the

between Eumenes and Craterus mentioned by Plutarch in Vita Eumenis where Eumenes placing the Horse before his Foot did it saith the Author because he held them the prime of his strength and therefore put upon them the hazard of the day and herein shewed himself both in counsel and action a brave and well-experienced General As for the best forms and fashions of Horse-battels the most ancient and then the most common was that of a Rhombe And this was in special account with the Thessalians witness Aelian cap. 18. who were reckoned for the best Horsemen of Greece as Xenothon reports them in his Hist. Graec. lib. 7. 644. D. and held that account to the time of King Pyrrus And for this form these reasons are given That it was fittest for all Encounters because the Horse thus postured were ready to turn Faces about any way upon all occasions That it could not be surprised in Flank or Rear as having the best and choice men in the Flank and the Commanders in every point of the Rhombe But the practice of our days consists most in the ordering of the Horse into square Bodies And the grounds hereof are That these forms are with most ease and facility to be put in order That they are aptest for the joynt movings of the Horse And that the Commanders do joyntly charge the Enemy in the Front which in no form can be done but this To speak freely of both these forms I opine with them who hold that the Rhombe in point of piercing and artificial breaking into the battel of an Army is the most proper unless perhaps that a Wedge be in the same case to be preferred for being narrow and pointed in the Front it naturally forceth a passage with the point and withal maketh way for the rest of the Body to follow and so without much ado piercing farther and farther it must necessarily hazard the breaking of the adverse Battel and so disperse it that afterwards execution may be done at pleasure On the other side the square Horse-battel in respect of doing execution and violent overthrowing of all in its way is to be preferred before any other for it bringeth more hands to fight and beareth down all things before it So that I see not but both these forms of Horse-battels may be held in use even in these times the one for entrance the other for bearing down this for a thorow execution that for a dispersion But there is one thing more in the ordering of Horse-battels of especial observation and that is their depth of which Leo his opinion was cap. 12. sect 40. that a Horse-battel was onely to be four in depth and his reasons were that bearing Lances the fifth was unprofitable because from thence their Lances could not reach to the Front neither saith he can Horse as Foot with their thickness or depth thrust one another forwards from behind and therefore in his opinion the number of four was sufficient for the depth in File And yet we find in Polybius that the Horse was for the most part in his time ordered eight in depth But this was in the Age of Lances In our now Pistol-world I finde the King of Swedens Horse which were ordered in the Wings of the Van at the battel of Lipzwick to be four in depth And those that were in the Wings of the Rear to be five in depth and so likewise were Tillies Horse In the battel of Lutzen the King of Swedens Horse were in no place above three in depth whereas Walsteins Horse were every where six It seems therefore that there can be no certain rule touching this particular but that it must be varied according to the number of Horse and the necessity of enlarging the fronts so that Aelians proportion may be received with most approbation for the general which is to double the number of the Front to the number of the Flank and as the number of the Troop ariseth to enlarge the length of the Front and the depth of the Flank proportionably one to another yet would I not have it to exceed the number of eight at any time in depth nor under four for the one extream loseth the fighting of some hands by reason of their over-depth and the other is over-weak to sustain any great shock I shall add one thing more which may concern both Horse and Foot concerning words of Command touching which I find that it was the ancient use witness Polyen lib. 4.217 sect 2. that when the Horse were commanded to turn to the right hand the word of Command was Turn to the Staff that is to that side where the Staff or Lance was then carried and when they were to turn to the left hand the word was Turn to the Reins because the Reins were born in the left hand And so to the Foot the words of Command were of old To the Pike when they were to turn to the right hand and to the Target when they were to turn to the left Now the present words of Command to this purpose both to Horse and Foot are To the right hand To the left hand To the right hand about To the left hand as you were To the left hand about To the right hand as you were Touching which I shall onely offer it to the consideration of our present Commanders whether it were not safer in this case to take up some other words of Command then those that are now in use And this in regard that our present words of Command To the right hand To the left hand are subject to be mistaken as being of too alike sound and may very well be taken one for another And all mistakes of this kind must needs be very disadvantagious and carry with them much of peril as all judicious men will readily confess So that we may do well to be herein presidented by our Sea-men who in their Sea-words of Command for the Condeing of a Ship use not to say Larboard the Helm but Port the Helm when they would have it to be put to the left side of the Ship lest by the affinity of the sound it should be taken for Star-board the Helm which is to have it to be put on the contrary side and that in many cases to a certain ruine And this also may be the better perfected by Aelians rule that the particular be placed first as to say to the Horse To the right hand turn your Face when you would have them turn to the right hand To the Reins or Sword turn your Face when they should turn to the left hand And to the Foot to say To the right hand turn your face when they are to move that way and To the Sword turn your faces when you would have them move to the left hand As for the words Double your Files or Ranks or Length or Depth The doubling of the length is to be used either to over-wing the Enemy or to avoid the