Darts were originally shortened throwing arrows (more like the now-banned lawn darts) that an archer could use if he was attacked at close quarters.
It’s worth noting that at Agincourt, at least, and perhaps at the other two great archery victories of the Hundred Years’ War, the English longbowmen carried long stakes, and mallets used to drive them into the ground, to protect themselves against cavalry. The mallets were a factor in the battle at Agincourt, when the archers waded into the melee wielding them (along with other hand weapons), so they must have been carrying significant numbers of them. So while I personally wouldn’t want to carry more than the longbow, arrows, and other gear, there’s evidence that the men of the day did carry long, heavy poles and mallets into battle with the archery gear.
I wonder if an atlatl would have been a better choice than a bow and arrow. Not nearly as much strength required, etc. Fairly low tech. Handy when you’ve shot your musket, the enemy is closing in and there’s not enough time to reload. Maybe get 2-3 darts/spears off before bayonet-time.
I’m surprised that back when grenadiers were in fashion, no one thought of using a simple throwing stick like people use nowdays to toss balls to dogs, to extend the range.
My guess is that grenades are a lot heavier than dog toys. I’ve heard that you can hurt yourself trying to throw a WWII model like you throw a baseball. Early grenades were probably even heavier (I do know that grenadiers were typically chosen from the tallest, strongest recruits). A throwing stick basically gives up power to get speed, which is fine if you’re throwing something light, but if it’s something so heavy that you need your strongest people to throw it, you don’t have a whole lot of power to give up.
I imagine (IOW, a wild ass guess) that Native American bows were much closer to bush bows much like I’ve seen in Africa and SE Asia. Good for taking out small game, not so much for warfare.
They didn’t get the horse until after the Europeans, either.
They were made of Iron, so weight was a factor. There was also the fact that lighting the fuze was a complex drill all of its own, the idea of having a stick in the way or having to attach it to a stick made things ummm, sticky.
Although there was the German “potato masher”…
Which was much later and much lighter. Also the fuse was in the bottom of the handle.
Is that easier to learn than a bow? I’ve tried it before, and I just couldn’t get the hang of it-- obviously I wasn’t in a military outfit, but still.
I always found a bow more intuitive. I never could get the knack with a throwing stick…I generally just pancaked the darts or had them flipping end over end through the air.
-XT
The quality of the bow for Native Americans would vary greatly from tribe to tribe. IIRC, the natives around New England had decent bows, but nothing that was a match for the Longbow. In Virginia the bows were pathetic, unable to penetrate a simple quilted coat (I might have this backwards). When you headed out West the bows got better (as the tribes were closer to Hunter-Gatherer tech level vs. the more advanced Eastern tribes, but again no match for Longbows.
One phrase that was used in the Longbow’s heyday was “If you want a good Longbow archer, start with the grandfather”. Says volumes.
From the column:
There was a reason “volley trading” was the norm: it was deadly as hell. The first line fires then falls back to reload while the second line fires, then falls back to reload, then third line etc. etc., then the first line is ready to fire again. While it’s true that the muskets were more “pointed in the general direction” instead of aimed when not at very close quarters, you’re talking several very deadly lines of musket balls flying at you ever minute. The notion of Americans being victorious by firing from behind trees was rarely if ever true- to shoot at them you have to stick your head up and that will like as not get you killed.
Similar tactics were still in use in the Civil War, by which time a seasoned soldier could get off about three shots per minute. The repeating rifle would of course change everything, though in the Civil War one of the repeating rifle’s deadliest uses in the war was its ability to fire in a rainstorm.
I’d say that by the Civil War, using cap locks and paper cartridges, as well as rifled barrels and the minie ball (which had a smaller diameter than the barrel so could be dropped in and loaded quicker), they were probably doing more like 5 shots a minute than 3 with a muzzle loader. Of course, by the end of the war they had stopped using the old Napoleonic tactics of large blocks of infantry in rigid formations, and the fact that the guns were rifled also made them much more deadly out to longer ranges than previously as well.
-XT
I didn’t realize until recently how many Europeans there were serving as neutral observers to the Civil War. They came from many nations and rode with both sides (though mainly Union for obvious reasons). Basically they knew the textbooks in military strategy were all obsolete and this war was one you didn’t want to miss in writing the ‘New Rules’.
They were using paper cartridges in Napoleonic and U.S. Revolutionary times. In fact they first started using paper cartridges back in the days of the matchlock. The two main changes to muskets between the Revolutionary War and the Civil War were the caplock and the Minie ball.
A rifle firing Minie balls was still a muzzle loaded weapon, and didn’t load any faster than the smooth bore flintlock that it replaced. In fact, if anything it was a bit slower, because the Civil War soldier had to reach to his belt twice, once to grab the cartridge and a second time to grab the cap. The Revolutionary soldier only had to reach to his belt once to get his cartridge. Whether you are firing a smooth bore flintlock or a rifled caplock, you are going to be only doing 3 to 4 rounds per minute either way.
The Minie ball didn’t speed up the loading of the standard infantry musket at all. What it did was it allowed the use of rifled barrels in standard infantry muskets, which hadn’t been done previously because rifling requires the round to fit more tightly so that it engages the rifling and spins. The black powder of the time quickly fouled the barrels, and after a few shots a rifle would become just about impossible to load. The Minie ball’s expanding skirt meant that it could be made smaller than the barrel so that it could still be loaded even when the barrel was fouled, but the skirt would expand and grip the rifling, imparting a spin to the round.
Breech loading rifles weren’t used in huge numbers during the civil war, but they really made a good showing. The military was so impressed that they completely switched to breech loading rifles immediately after the war, first by making conversion kits for the old rifle muskets, and then producing breech loaders from scratch.
And although this is long past the point where anyone was still considering bows and arrows, another advantage of breech loaders was that you didn’t have to stand up to load them. Especially in bush country fighting, this was huge.
I don’t have a cite to the contrary, but I have a hard time believing this. The East Coast tribes did have agriculture (as did the western plains Indians), but they also hunted deer in the forest, and the bigger nations like Iroquese went on the warpath. So they would certainly need bows strong enough to kill a hundred kilo elk or deer, or an enemy.
Likewise, the plains Indians, by the time the English arrived, had already adapted to the horses that escaped from the Spanish settlers down south and become Mustangs, and learned how to hunt buffaloes from horseback. While they also used spears for that, their bows were certainly up to task. So just because the bows didn’t have a 100 pound draw, or were not mans-lenght, but shorter, doesn’t mean they lacked the penetrating power. After all, the Indians managed to kill not only each other, but also a lot of colonists.
As soon as the English arrived in the Northern Americas, the Indians started to trade for iron, knives, pots and arrow/spear heads. Partly this was pure necessity: the colonials on purpose sold only the older models of rifles at exaggerated cost to the Indians. So only a part of the tribe would have rifles, the rest would still use bows+ arrows and spears. Plus, a rifle needed balls (shot) and powder, which would have to be bought at again great price. If you couldn’t refuel, you were fucked up.
In contrast, you could always cut more arrows from the next bush, and knap some flint for heads. You could recover spent arrows after a battle (Try that with shot balls), and during the early years, rate of firing was much higher with a bow than with the older muskets and guns.
In event of rain or river crossing, you only had to take down the bow string and wrap it into an oiled pouch to keep your equipment safe. With a gun, water could get into the chambers. If either the powder or the sparking mechanism got wet, you were once again fucked up.
As for the noise and smoke as intimidation: if you aren’t fighting army-style, but guerilla-style, like the Apaches and other tribes did, a silent arrow that kills a man suddenly without warning can be more frighenting than a loud bang (think of snipers in WWII and later). You hide several people in the bush and they pick the enemy off one by one.
I don’t know how long it would be necessary to train for the Indian bow - because there was less draw, you needed less muscle. The Indians did start at age 5-7 in most tribes (often with a bit drastic methods, e.g. they would put the food in a bag in the branch of a tree, and the kid had to shoot his meal down, or he would go hungry. Or the kid hat to hit a target 5 times before he got breakfast). But the result of that was superb bowmanship; presumably the colonists could have gone by with less.
I think this is still a little off. My understanding is that the general idea in 18th Century warfare wasn’t to pull up and trade volleys indefinitely. Rather the attacker’s plan was usually to get off one or two volleys then charge and settle things with the bayonet. Doing this in a tight bunched line didn’t work so well once rifled muskets and then machine guns arrived, since the defenders could take out way too many attackers before they got to close quarters, but in smoothbore musket times it worked.
Remember, even today, infantry small-arms tactics for attacking are generally about trying to get as close as possible to the defenders, with long-range fire being generally a means to get close rather than the primary way of killing defenders.
The problem with shooting from behind trees in Napoleonic/Revolutionary times is that each guy behind a tree is only going to get off a couple decent shots before the attacking army gets close enough to reach around the tree with a bayonet and ruin the defender’s day. So to stop an army you need a lot of defenders shooting, and there usually aren’t enough convenient trees to do so, since the attacking army will just march around the big forest you’ve got your defending army in. When the attackers couldn’t march around – defending towns and the like – defenders were happy to build walls, trenches and other things to hide behind and shoot from, so clearly the problem isn’t shooting from cover itself; it’s just that there weren’t enough trees around on the typical battlefield.
There are a couple of other reasons for massed formations.
If you have a scattered line, you’re vulnerable to cavalry charges. Massed pikes or bayonets in the hands of steady infantry can repel any cavalry. But if the cavalry can ride through the line and get behind you? Then you’re fucked, and the cavalry will cut you to pieces, and your men will rout, and then they’ll *really *get cut to pieces.
You also need command and control. If your officers and buddies can’t see you, who knows what you’ll do. Maybe you’ll keep your head down and not fire, or maybe you’ll run away. When you’re standing next to your buddies and the captain has his eye on you, you fight.
Next, concentration of fire. Sure, a scattered line can cover more distance. But if you have 1000 guys in a scattered line fighting 1000 guys in a tight line, all 1000 of the tightly packed guys can bring their weapons to bear on the same part of the line. That means they punch a hole in the line. That means the cavalry can charge through the line. A formation packed twice as tightly can put twice as many bullets into the formation facing them. A lose formation gives you the Bruce Lee vs. ninja effect–the ninjas attack Bruce one at a time, and he kicks all their asses. If they attacked him all at once, they’d overwhelm him.
Of course, the solution to tightly massed infantry is artillery, which was Napoleon’s specialty. And by the time of the Civil War, rifles and accurate artillery made massed infantry suicide.