KILLED and WOUNDED in ANCIENT and MODERN WARFARE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXIV, Issue 8082, 24 September 1887, Page 2 (Supplement)

KILLED and WOUNDED in ANCIENT and MODERN WARFARE.

At the battle of Talavera (1S09), the loss in killed and wounded was one-eighth of those engaged. At Austerlitz (1805), it was one* seventh. At Malplaquet (1709), at Prague (1759), and at Jena (1836), it was one-sixth. At Friedland (1807) and at Waterloo (1815), one-fifth. At Marengo (1800), it amounted to one-fourth. At Salamanca (1812), out of 90,000 combatants 30,000 were killed or wounded. At Borodino (1812), out of 250,000, 80,000 fell on the two sides. At Leipaic (1813), the French sustained a loss of onethird of their total effective force. At Preußsich Eylau (1807), 55,000 were killed or wounded out of a combined total of 160,000 combatants, giving a loss of more than onethird ; while at Zorndorf (1758), the most murderoUs battle which history records in modern times, out of 82,000 Russian and Prussian troops engaged, 32,800 were stretched on the field at the close of the day. Let Ufa now come to more recent times. The first great battle in which rifled firearms were used was Solferino (1859), and when the war broke out it was confidently predicted that the effects of the new weapon would be frightful; but the loss actually fell to I'll of those engaged. At Koniggratz, where, in addition to rifled weapons, one side was armed with breechloaders, the actual loss was further diminished to I*ls. Finally, we come to the Franco-Prussian war, in which the proportions were :—Worth, I'll ; Gravelofcts, l'l2;and Sedan, 5.10. These figures may surprise mauy. who, not unnaturally, imagined that improved weapons entailed increased slaughter. It is not intended to imply that battles are not still sanguinary, but it is incontestable that they Eire much less so than they were.