…Labour Market Challenges
"Imagine it is 1808 and you are a recruiting officer for the regular army. Your task is to find new soldiers for your regiment. Without a system of military conscription, you face significant challenges. Unlike the navy's recruiting parties, you are not allowed to press gang people into military service. How big is your task? What challenges will you face, and how can you succeed?
Simply put, your task is enormous and difficult, with a lot of competition. Between 1803 and 1815, about 650,000 people served in the regular army, militia, or as volunteers. The 1804 militia list shows that the main target group for military recruitment—men in Britain between 18 and 30 years old without children—comprised 562,601 individuals.
From 1808 to 1815, the army will recruit about 120,000 men through regular enlistment. However, this is insufficient to fill the gaps or raise new battalions. About 100,000 men are transferred from the militia to the regular forces, but even this is not enough. In 1810, the recruiting deficit is nearly 14,000. This deficit improves slightly to about 10,000 men per year from 1811 to 1814. Overall, the army never managed to recruit enough men to make up for losses due to desertion, discharge, or death…"
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Armand
returns to Flintloque to paint an Ogre.
