PIKES CARRIED BY ALLIES till 1706!!!

18th Century Guy · Post by **18th Century Guy** » Tue May 06, 2008 1:44 am

Huevans07,

Maybe one other item that might have 'improved' things would be the cadenced march. I'm just tossing it out because around the time of the WAS the cadence was introduced which allowed for more flexibility within the battalion. Also by this time everyone had the flintlock which gave the battalion a little bit more control over their output (for lack of a better term). So I'm not looking at one technological breakthrough, I'm looking at an accumulation of things when put together make the WAS & SYW period more 'advanced' than the WSS.

hwiccee · Post by **hwiccee** » Tue May 06, 2008 9:17 am

It was a combination of various things - iron ramrod, cadenced marching which meant closer formations & better control, minor changrs in the gun itself, etc.

It is difficult to be precise but between the WSS and the WAS rates of fire at least doubled and probably tripled. Plus formations got denser and so easier to hit even with the muskets of the time. This made fire power the only real option in the WAS but not in the WSS/GNW period.

hwiccee · Post by **hwiccee** » Tue May 06, 2008 9:19 am

Iain: OK I will look through my copies of the works you mention and see if I can find what you mean.

pabblo41 · Post by **pabblo41** » Tue May 06, 2008 10:41 am

The other big technology and orginsational change from the WSS to the WAS and SYW is artillary - The guns got better, lighter, more manouverable etc and the arm got organised into batteries, with crews and their transport becoming part of the military establishment.

Also the Cavalry arm got smaller in terms of % of the overall army compliment, and due to the increase in fire power their staying power (for want of a better term) also decreased, and as time wore on became a fire and forget weapon (by the Napoleonic wars Wellington considered british cavalry to be just that).

18th Century Guy · Post by **18th Century Guy** » Tue May 06, 2008 12:28 pm

I know I asked this question before and the answer was that the French did not use pikes after 1703. But do we have clear evidence of that? Could this same issue be affecting the French as well and we should see some (not sure how many) units with pikes? I know Louis spent his nation into a vast debt (does this parallel something today?

) but he also seemed to be a bit cheap as well. Anyway, I'll ask again if anyone is aware of French using the pike up to the 1707 period when some say the Brits finally stopped using them.

hwiccee · Post by **hwiccee** » Wed May 07, 2008 7:39 am

Hi Iain,

I have most of the works you mention but unfortunately only a few to hand. To hand I only have Dumont and some parts of Pelet. Can you give me some pages or other indication of where to look in these?

Thanks.

huevans07 · Post by **huevans07** » Wed May 07, 2008 10:56 pm

Just curious as to whether anyone thinks that the retention of pikes by the English had anything to do with the 3-rank line?

The French still retained a 4- or 5-rank line which may have been considered steadier when confronted with cavalry. Possibly the 3-rank formation may have initially been thought too thin to survive without pikemen.

Marechal de France · Post by **Marechal de France** » Sat Apr 02, 2011 11:05 am

Wow, reading through all the posts here in this topic, I am glad that eventhough there might be no definate answer, I have painted 7 generic stand with pikes to add to some of my French units. I think this generally displays the time of transition, where privately owned regiments had colonels who lacked the money to finance new muskets to all their men.