"SYW in India: Indian Artillery" Topic

I read in Malleson's "History of the French in India" that Indian gunners considered it normal shooting to get off 1 shot in 15 minutes. This is seconded by Mike Kirby in his booklet on the SYW in India (slow rate of fire vis a vis European guns). Now, I am going to add this to the rules that we play "Honour and Fortune", but I wanted some more feedback and I have listed several reasons why I believe that they had such a low rate of fire:

1. Poor metallurgy of the guns – needing longer to cool down.
2. Powder that was not corned, so that they had to remix powder "in situ" before each shot.
3. Guns were an investment by the gunners, therefore they were loath to risk a loss of livelyhood by shooting too frequently.
4. Mixed castes in the gun crew: Brahmins to aim and fire, Ksatiras (sp) to load, untouchables to run the gun up.
5. Enshrinement of tradition: – because the early Moghuls considered it adequate firing (1 shot in 15 mintues) several centuries before, it became the standard for the 1740 – 1760 gun crews to achieve.
6. Gunners had to buy their own powder, so they were loathe to spend it all up on a reckless cannonade in case their employer lost the battle.

Could you give me some feedback or refrences that I could further expand my knowledge base.

Thanks

I understood it to be poor training, leadership, and organization/logistics, but I don't really have a source, other than I believe Mike Kirby mentions this in his book. I imagine it sort of like teenagers working at the local fast food joint when the manager isn't around.

Plus some of these were still monstrous guns, so I imagine it took a while to load all that powder and the shot, even if you weren't taking a smoke break behind the hill.

Chris

On the Crisis show we did a demo game on India 1760 and I happened to have an intensive chat with a Swiss who was researching India, including politics and warfare, for over 10 years already. Wealso discussed artillery, since we also deployed some models of the super heavy guns, fired from ox-drawn platforms. They are known from (not contemporary) drawing and some indian written sources. They were said to have a firing rate of once per half hour. This specialist told me that especially the Moguls were known for the high quality of the gun-castings; so this would be no reason than for the low rate of fire. He also thought the reason was lying more in the logistic, training and mentality of the mixed crews.

Like this?
link

It is an impressive model and I would not argue the low rate of fire; a bound to move and a bound to fire (30 minutes). But I have wondered, what is to stop the oxen from bolting after cannon has fired?

Andygamer,
we had almost the same at the crisis show but then in 15mm.
See aldegarde.nl

Is is any clear contemporary evidence of the design, i.e. a field gun *with its field carriage* put atop a wagon? And the sandbags look a really 'modern' protection… Reminds me of some improvised 'portees' of early WW2 in the Middle-East.

I will not argue about the solid wheels -but are they really more solid than the (typically Indian) multi-spoked wheels of traditionnal 'juggernauts' link
picture or the *very heavy* pieces picture picture ; what surprises me most is the field carriage: I'd have supposed instead a carriage of the fortress / navy type, perhaps with a system of ropes to restrain the recoil, as in contemporary warships?
How were mounted the very light guns on jingal elephants (and a believe elephants are more shy than oxen, btw -and elephants are helping to push the gun wagons chalklands.wordpress.com anyway…)
And wodden mantlets were known for ages… No immediate relation, but they were no sandbags on Hussite warwagons?