WHY DID THE REDCOATS STAND IN A LINE TO FIRE MUSKETS?

And that's why the US pushed their shit in.

>>33958021
Try giving orders to 1,000 troops spread out over a battlefield covered in smoke and gun and cannon shots

>>33958043
Oh, also remember that your average line trooper is an illiterate chav that was probably a criminal at one point and would bail form the fight the second you say "take cover in those bushes"

>>33958021
>And that's why the US pushed their shit in.
How can you be so ignorant of your own history? Everyone fought in lines except for skirmishers and skirmishers do not win battles.

The rank and file were considered to need lots of drill and an officer standing over them at all times in order to actually accomplish anything and not flee.

I'm also tired of people acting like they just know better and people in the past were all idiots because they have the benefit of hindsight. Some thread a while ago asked what could have been done different on WWI and every answer was describing something learned as a result of WWI. Oh they could employ the tactics that were developed after WWI SPECIFICALLY BECAUSE THE OTHER TACTICS DIDN'T WORK WOW YOU'RE A FUCKING GENIUS.

Man I'm in a bad mood today.

>>33958021
It's not about accuracy but concentrating firepower. A drilled unit would also swap ranks sending volley after volley.

>>33958088
Don't worry anon, I agree with you :3

I'll add people doing those crazy hypotheticals and assuming whatever enemy it's employed against would carry on as they did through the rest of the war without adapting their strategy or tactics at all.

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>>33958088
Would a loli with a shitty bra cheer you up anon?

>>33958021
Yeah dude you try giving orders to thousands of troops spread out over a mile battlespace with no modern communications equipment.
Should work great.

>>33958114
>>33958116
A little bit cheered.

>>33958021
Concentrated fire and volume of fire created but having successive rows firing. Having rows fire in a succession allowed for high volumes of continuous fire.

>>33958030
No. Skimisher units had a place, and were useful as scouts and as diversions, but when it came to taking and holding ground, you needed conventional fighting.

Von Steuben was largely responsible for whipping the Colonial forces into shape as a force capable of fighting off the British. He did this by taking the poorly trained Continental forces and drilling them to fight the way the British fought.

For skirmish units, they were used by BOTH sides. The fairly famous Roger's Rangers unit was employed by the British, because they recognized the value of skimisher and scout units. Combined arms is a philosophy as old as war.

>>33958088
Not to mention that most peoples' understanding of WW1 tactics is total pop history bullshit that has been fudged to make a more digestable narrative. People like things that are easy tidbits and feel like little zingers. The truth is muddier. In WW1, by the end the British had developed small unit manuals which were decently recognizable as conventional infantry tactics, but nobody cares because the "le over the top we throw more men at them than they have bullets" image is more compact and makes the reader feel smart.

>>33958021
The psychological effect of a bunch of your friends going down all at once vs them getting slowly picked off one at a time should not be underestimated.

>>33958116

What's the sauce on this?

>>33958021
Command and control, morale, resistance to cavalry and assaults, ability to take ground. Naturally, anybody saying it had anything to do with the inacuracy of the musket was bullshitting, so of course you will hear it in any pop history article.

>>33958021
In dispersed vs. concentrated units, the dispersed unit basically gets one shot before they either get pinned down and die, or have to run away. Now, this is exactly what skirmish units did, but you try actually taking a position while fighting like that.

Plus, no modern command and control via radios, and the battlefield gets cluttered as fuck with black powder smoke. The side with a well drilled and sticks together will be able to keep their shit together and operate as a unit. A bunch of spread out individuals will rely only on their individual judgement, which means no teamwork or ability to react to battle developments in a coherent manner, as well as a far larger chance of route and panic.

And did I mention calvary? Individuals on their own are begging to get fucked up by calvary mop up.

Scout units that fought in dispersed ways back then ran the fuck away when they encountered as serious fight (or got surrounded and died). Just like modern scout units.

>>33958088
Well, I mean, what exactly would you be expecting to happen? Of course any reply is going to be exactly that.

>>33958043
This.

It should be noted that the British (and every other army) did use more "modern" tactics in smaller unit engagements.

Everyone standing in a big fucking line was about maintaining unit cohesion when you had thousands of men.

Why do you think the American Civil War looks the same way? Shit, just about every war up to the turn of the 20th century looked like this.

Just to dive into history a little bit more, this is why WW1 was such clusterfuck. By that point we had the technology to quickly obliterate these kinds of formations (machine guns, modern artillery, poison gas, etc), but not the technology to allow coordinated maneuvers over a large area (man-portable radios).

>>33958216
Accuracy was part of it, less so that pop history makes out, but it can't be discounted entirely. That said, the British did reject more accurate guns as service weapons because volume of fire was more important and the combat accuracy of a unit was more important than any single soldier.

Bigger issue with the guns of the time is the rate of fire and the complexity of reloading. It is a lot easier to reload when you're in a unit with other rows providing cover fire for you than it is to reload while skirmishing and running for your life at the same time.

>>33958301
Pop history has it that they needed to stand in lines to maximise firepower against other infantry. This is bullshit because it is proportionally countered by the increased casualties they would take and the real reason is for the reasons already said in the thread. Skirmishing increases rate of fire marginally because firing in line involves firing in sync with the rest of the row, and involves a lot of waiting around. Your "cover fire" does nothing.

>>33958030
>this is what burgers actually believe

>>33958358
>Skirmishing increases rate of fire marginally because firing in line involves firing in sync with the rest of the row, and involves a lot of waiting around. Your "cover fire" does nothing.

But volume of firepower is important. Consider a line unit vs. a skirmish unit in pitched combat (for whatever reason the skirmish unit stuck around). The skirmishers are diffuse and separated from each other. Effectively every time they shoot back and forth against a line unit it is an entire line formation's worth of guns vs. a single guy.

A line unit can provide a faster rate of fire on a target than a skirmish unit. The individual soldier in a line unit is reloading about 4 times a minutes in combat (6 times a minute is ideal, but combat slows things down). It involves waiting to fire, but the soldier is able to repeatably reload while the other ranks are firing, which keeps up the volume of fire.

An individual in a skirmish unit is going to lose rate of fire in a fight against a line unit because they are going to either die or spend a lot of time moving away from the line unit. These things are all sounded pretty obvious, but it is building to the point that fighting in a skirmish formation doesn't work for taking ground or holding ground when the opponent uses formations with drilled shooting.

All the command & control stuff and ability to keep troops from routing is also relevant.

>>33958213
Rondo Duo

I don't recommend it solely on the basis that you'll be saying goodbye to whatever current fetishes you possess.

>>33958021
Imagine if bayonet or cavalry charge landed on them and then you'll realise why.

>>33958452
>Effectively every time they shoot back and forth against a line unit it is an entire line formation's worth of guns vs. a single guy.
Density of fire doesn't matter, because it's balanced by density of exposure too.

>but the soldier is able to repeatably reload while the other ranks are firing, which keeps up the volume of fire
Skirmishers are able to reload at all times, what are you smoking? A line formation is able to assault, that much of obvious, it has nothing to do with the rate of fire. If skirmishers have to move, the line formation has to move as well. You say
>the soldier is able to repeatably reload while the other ranks are firing, which keeps up the volume of fire.
but this is completely irrelevant.

>All the command & control stuff and ability to keep troops from routing is also relevant.
No, it has nothing to do with firepower being a requirement for line formation.

>>33958030
Early on the British had several crushing victories against patriot forces, due in part to their discipline and professionalism.
Also, British infantry units would fire a few volleys and then charge with bayonets; nobody wants to stand around to get bayonetted so they normally run away. European advisors were horrified when watching the American Civil War because both sides would just stand there blasting each other and suffering horrendous casualties because of it.

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They wore brightly colored uniforms so that you could easily distinguish between friend and foe on the battlefield.
This is especially helpful when there's MASSIVE amounts of smoke on the battlefield, as an officer you don't want to unintentionally open fire on a friendly unit.

Continental Armies wore color uniforms as well, see pic.
Skirmishers wore more "natural" colors, like brown or dark green. Both the Continental Army and British Army made use of skirmishers during the war, based on experiences during the French & Indian War.

>>33958021

Ok, so you're spread out, taking up more space with less men. Your density of fire has gone down, your men no longer cover each other with successive lines of fire. If a cavalry attack comes, you will never form a grid square protective formation in time.

Skirmishers certainly have a place, but you don't base your strategy around it.

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>>33958170
American education here, I can confirm that it makes better story telling to say that's everyone died of trench foot in France
Honestly, I was taught that once the Germans failed to take Paris they fell back and dug trenches, effectively putting the blame on the team that lost
In the end, when the Allies started pushing the Central Powers back, obviously modern infantry maneuvers had to be used, who the fuck was going tim stand by and wait for the Germans to dig more trenches?

>>33958534
The simple fact is that in a straight fight (firefight or charge) of skirmishers vs line, the line will win. It might take more casualties in the process (it has, must have, more men in the same width in the first place) but it will drive the skirmishers from the field. Thus one can gain ground, flank other enemy units, pursue them with cavalry etc. Sure you can alleviate that by arranging for staggered lines of skirmishers or surrounding the line, but in a large scale battle, such formations quickly become uncontrollable; plus they never work very well against cavalry. A napoleonic general trying such a thing would get his forces destroyed piece by piece and his artillery and supply overrun, unable to hold any ground against enemy lines and cavalry.

In a small scale battle, yes you're right. In a fight between two small, similar amounts of men, the one spread out will always do better; the more inaccurate the weapons the better in fact. As it happens, that's exactly what sensible commanders did in small scale battles.

>>33958170
What was the name of the small unit manuals? For research purposes, I believe you.

>>33958021
Because of cavalry, you needed to be able to form your men into a square quick, also Command and Control. Literally every European Army did this.

However the British did take a note from the Americans. John Moore who served in Nova Scotia during the Revolutionary War later became a general in the British Army and pioneered the use of light infantry in the British Army which led to almost every regiment fielding a unit of light infantry.

The french also fielded similar excellent light infantry which were better trained than their British counterparts in overall quality but lacked the innovation that the British and Austrians had when it came to equipment. The British employed two regiments with some of the first service issued rifled muskets and the Austrians used semi-automatic rifled air guns. Both units were highly successful during the revolutionary war.

If you want to learn more about John Moore (Who was an exceptional general) I suggest reading the fort by Bernard Cromwell.

>>33959514
I mean successful during the Napoleonic war's

>>33958170
>Skimisher units had a place, and were useful as scouts and as diversions
>The fairly famous Roger's Rangers unit was employed by the British, because they recognized the value of skimisher and scout units.
Europe used skirmishers not so much as scout or for diversion (that's the role of various cavalry units) but as part of the battle force; to do harrasing in preparation of the clashing of the lines and to exploit special terrain. American warfare with lower force densities, longer distances and more wilderness was a bit different to european warfare.

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>>33958021
>A line of people firing at the same time has the same chance of hitting the target as everyone standing scattered and firing at different times.

cracking idea chap...you should deploy these tactics immediately. cheers, HM Dragoons.

>>33958261
>And did I mention calvary?
What does the crucifixion have to do with this?

>>33959724
Its a wonder hes not at Sandhurst already with out of the box thinking like that

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>>33959829
indeed! a natural master of the art of war one could say.

>>33958280
The first time an all-skirmisher force saw battle wouldn't be until the Franco-Prussian War, which was fought with needleguns.

>>33958816
Also, by that point they were using percussion rifles with Minie Balls, giving them greater accuracy and deadlier wounds while retaining the same rate of fire.

>>33958030
I learned US history from Mel Gibson

>>33959431
No, that's not how it works. The line wins against skirmishers because it is advancing. If all it does is stand there trading fire both sides will take casualties at the same proportional rate no matter whether they are in line or skirmish, all other things being equal. This is Napoleonic warfare 101.

>>33958021
No one has said this but muskets are a bitch to reload in any position besides standing.

>>33958021
Because if your scattered, or skirmishing, and all you have are muskets, a pike square, or infantry square with bayonets fixed can literally steamroll over you

Its the most basic tactic ever, how do you stop their guys from ganging up on your guys? be in a big group