FIGURES OF BATTLE.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LII, Issue 15807, 2 January 1915, Page 4 (Supplement)

FIGURES OF BATTLE.

LOSSES IN AUTHENTIC WARS.

COST OF RECENT CAMPAIGNS

I'.iTEEX thousand million human lives, a sum total far too great to be grasped by any imagination, have been lost in -war since the beginning of authetic history, if the exhaustive researches made by Dr. Benjamin Trueblood are to be accepted

Thus battle has cost the world a number of peop'.e greater than that of all those ■who have inhabited the globe during the 'net fix centuries.

But perhans this statement is too general and complicated of computation to be impressive to the average mind, so it may he better to turn to definite consideration of the nineteenth century.

War during this period, according to a v- -y conservative estimate, cost the lives of 14.000,000 men through wounds and disease, 6,C00 being sacrificed in the Napoleonic campaigns alone, and in the 19 years between 1796 and 1815.

The war of 181214 between England and the United States resulted in the death of about 50,000 men.

The. war of 1846-48 between the United States amd Mexico cost another 50,000 lives, most of the American deaths being from disease.

The Crimean war of 1854-56 cost the five nations involved—France, England, Piedmont, Turkey, and Russia—7Bs,ooo men, 600,000 of wiiom died from sickness and hardship.

Little Schleswig-Holstein's comparatively unimportant war in 1864 cost Denmark, Russia, and Austria 3500 men.

The American Civil war—lß64-65—cost the United States between 800,000 and 1,000,000 lives from wounds and disease, or, to strike an average between the two estimates. 900. lives.

The short war between Prussia, Austria, and Italy in 1866 cost 45.000 lives.

European expeditions to Mexico. Morocco. Cochin-China, Lebanon, Paraguay, etc., between 1861 and 1867, cost 65,000 li\ es.

The Fianoo-Prussian war of 1870-1 cost mere than 223.000 lives.

The Russo-Ttirkish war of 1871 cost no les« than 250,000 lives.

T)t> Zulu and Afghan wars in 1879 cost 40.000 lives.

The Japo-Chinese war of 1894-95. according (v crude and surely incomplete estimates, cost 15,000 lives. " The Boer war, 1899-1901. cost the lives o 125.000 men.

in' 1 Spanish-American war of 1898 cost both aides, from wounds and disease, less than 6000 lives, b::t the Philippine aftermath of this war has cost the United States the less of about 5000 soldiers, and the loss among the native Filipinos, from wounds and disease, during the entire period of definite war and occasional righting, has amounted, it is said, to men.

The Napoleonic Wars. The cosit of war in money runs even further beyond the limitations of human comprehension. The Napoleonic wars cost France, Great Britain, Germany, Italy, Austria, Spain, Russia, and Turkey, all 'of "™bom were involved, in actual 'expenditure and destruction, not counting loss of trade and other economic waste, not less than £3,000.000,000. The grand total of this vast expenditure on war between the years 1812-1905 has been about £6,600,000.000, and the cost of innumerable little wars, of which England alone had 80 during the past century, and of which, for -another example, there have been an uncounted number in South and Central America, as well as in the foreign possessions of the various European nations (as, for example, India), -would surely, add something close to £ 1,000,000,000 to this total. And, for purposes ok convenience, wo may make a grand total' of £3.000,000,000." But to judge with such figures in an attempt to estimate what it has cost* to kil so many men, is a cumbersome task, so it is well to reduce the observations to tho cost of and the total of lives lost during the great comparatively modem wars. beginning not further back than the' "Napoleonic conipaigns, including in the list only che Napoleonic wars, the AngloAmerican war of 1512, the "United StatesMexican war of 1846, the Crimean war of 1854, the American Civil war. the FrancoPrussian war, the Riteso-Turkish war of 1877, the Boer war, the Spanish-American war, and the Russo-Japanese war. Taking these alone, and with the certainty that most of the estimates are under by a list of ten campaigns, in which 0,396,000 soldiers last their lives through wounds or disease, and which cost the combantant nations £6,616,200.000. This suggests a neat arithmetical conclusion. It is this: It costs more than £735 to kill olio man in warfare. Cost Per War. The cost of killing every man who falls in the present, European struggle will be ranch greater than that, in all human probability, for, •with the development of sighting- armament has become more elaborate and expensive as methods of defence have become more efficient and costly. Each addition to the cost of either increases the cost of individual slaughter. The tabie upon which the previous cost of death is based follows } —

Now, the actual cost of killing a man in warfare is really but a small portion of the real expense in money of conducting, enduring, and recovering from war. The destruction of property which accompanies warfare invariably is enormous, and the sum total of its amount cannot be included in any possibly accurate estimate of a war' 3 cost, for obvious reasons. Principally among these is the fact that "here is. absolutely no manner by means of which it can be determined. Consider the march of the Germans through Belgium— more or less complete destruction of the wonderfully rich city of Louvain— destruction which never can be repaired, for Louvain's value had been cumulative through the centuries. Then, again, there was the voluntary sacrifice by the French of property in the environs of Paris, razed so that it might not obstruct the play of the defending artillery. This might well indicate, in that comparatively tiny area, a' huge total monetary loss. No strictly modern war, until the beginning of the one now in progress, hag offered much opportunity for this sort of waste. The Kusso-Japaneee war was fought in a territory comparatively free of high property values, as was the South African campaign. The Balkan war involved peoples possessed of slight property values, and was largely carried on in mountain fastnesses and infertile valleys.

But it seems to be a peculiarity of this war that it will be fought out in those places where it can ccst humanity most in mateii?! ind aesthetic values, as well as by such methods as will make its tax of human life unprecedentedly heavy.

A'ice Counter Amherst, who is to many Princ- Jean Sap:ei':i, the Polish nobleman who -was recentlv held to be technically an " alien ene:ny," formerly stood in the curious position of being stepmother to her own brother-in-law. The relationship was created by lather and son marrying two sis-ter=— daughters of the late Mr. Edmund Prnbyn, of Huntley Manor and Longhope, Gloucestershire, Miss Alice Probyn became the second wife of the fifth Earl of Lisburne in 1878 ; ten years later her sister, Mi - s Evelyn Probyn, married the sixth earl, the son of her tatter's husband. For a few months they were at the same time Countess of Lisburne, but in 1889 the widow of the fifth earl married the late Earl Amherst, who left her a widow for a second time four years ago. The present Earl of Lisburne js both her nephew and the grandv son of her first husband. 4

Cost. War. No. Killed. £ Napoleonic ... 6.000,000 3,000.000.000 U.S. -British, 1812 ... 60,000 60.000,000 TLS.-Me-TicMi, 1846 ... 50,000 36.000.000 Crimean. 1854 ... 785.000 333.200,000 American Civil ... 900.000 1.600.000.000 Franoo-Prua.. 1871 ... 225,000 600,000,000 Russo-Turk, 1877 ... 250,000 220,000,000 Span.-Amer-, 1898 ... 6,000 160,000,000 Brit-Boer. 1893 ... 180.000 260.000.000 Fusso.-Jap., 1904 ... 550.000 347.000.000 8,996,000 £6,616,200,000