In the column on Colera Belts, Cecil refers to the story of the British artilleryman whose job was to “hold the horses” during WWII, years after horses were no longer used to tow artillery. He refers to this as an apocryphal story.
Perhaps it is apocryphal, perhaps not. It certainly spreads like one, since in a Google search, I found it in half dozen or so different places with no two versions the same. Generally it’s used as an example of how “we’ve always done it that way” is not a good thing.
The first place I encountered this story was in Freeman Dyson’s book “Disturbing the Universe”. Unfortunately, I haven’t been able to find my copy of this book. But I do know that Dyson worked as an analyst for the British military during WWII. So he or one of his fellow analysts could have been the one to notice the horse holder. I definitely remember that it was found when they closely examined films of an artillery crew in action, a detail not in any of the online versions I found.
Anyway, does anyone else have this book? If so could you tell us who, if anyone, he gives credit to for finding it.
Well, from a strictly practical horsemanship perspective, yes, it’s not just a “possibly apocryphal” story–it’s probably a complete Fairy Tale. It seems to be presuming that Once Upon A Time, in military practice, an artillery battery had a team of horses that drew the artillery to its location, and that there was an “eleventh man” whose job it was to stand there and hold the horses while the artillery was fired.
This is from Civil War artillery, but the principles are the same.
Here’s what it looks like with the horses hitched up. As noted above, each “driver” (really “rider”) is responsible for two horses. He’s riding one, and controlling the one right next to him.
IANA military historian, but I am an actual “horsey person”, and I don’t think there ever could have been any single “eleventh man” whose job it was to hold the horses. We’re talking about four to six horses per gun. Speaking from practical experience, I know that one man can handle two calm horses, but even a single panic-stricken horse can be a challenge for one man, let alone four to six. Even if you had them in the harness (“strapped together” for you non-horsey people), and hitched to a gun (“weighted down”, for you non-horsey people), if a shell exploded close by and they panicked, one man alone wouldn’t be able to keep them from bolting. When you see horses bolting with the stagecoach in Westerns, that’s not a joke–it really does happen, and there’s not much a 200 lb. man can do to keep 4,800 to 7,200 pounds of panic-stricken horseflesh from heading towards the horizon at a dead run if that’s what they really, really, really wanna do.
It took a lot more than one man to “hold the horses”.
It wasn’t the crew commanders’ job to “hold the horses”, it was the job of the drivers and the “spare men”, and the crew commanders may have made this gesture, but only as a reminder to their crews. So I’m assuming this research is what possibly morphed into the “eleventh man” story.
Freeman Dyson is a physicist, not a career Army guy, or an artillery expert, or a military historian? And Disturbing the Universe is a treatise on nuclear disarmament? So it might not be totally outside the realm of possibility that Dyson might have included an anecdote about the “eleventh man”, perhaps simply a poorly remembered version of what was discovered by British army engineers 40 years earlier, in order to illustrate the futility of military establishments? His specialty is “technical follies”?
dtilque I got Dyson’s book from the library this afternoon. Went through it quickly but didn’t find the story. Have gone through it again about half way, more slowly this time. Still nothing. Could it be another book?
Can’t resist chiming in with the story of the French troops during the war with Prussia in 1870 who wasted two hours halting their columns in the middle of the day – to guard against Berber raiders – in west central France.
Didn’t the Russians still have some horse-drawn artillery during WW2?
Well, I guess it was about time I was the subject of one of DDG’s impressive tours de Google. I don’t know how you manage to find time to do them.
At any rate, you seem to have demolished the idea that a single man could have held the horses needed to pull an artillery piece. And about the quibble, you found yet another version of the story, which doesn’t surprise me in the least.
samclem, I was going from memory, since I haven’t read the book in several years. And I think I may have sold my copy of it. However, I seem to remember that there was also a discussion of the size of access hatches in British bombers in that book and that the stuff on the horses was fairly close to that. I don’t recall having read any other books by Dyson, but it’s quite possible I am mixing him up with someone else.
