Ammo Supply???

[matt45]

Hello The Camp
I am popping over from the Spencer site.  There is a thread there labeled Henry V. Spencer, and it mostly deals with the Civil War, but would apply to the Frontier Era as well.
  
St. George brought up a good point re: ordinance officers and supply, and the general good idea of having a weapon that one could get ammo for.

So... My question is how did ordinance officers plan ahead for ammo consumption, and what kind of problems did they run into because of differant ammunition types.  Thanks for any info

[St. George]

First - it's 'Ordnance' - the term 'ordinance' implies some variety of ruling...

That said - the Ordnance Officer of the time was probably Back East in a comfortable Arsenal or Post - working on things like R&D - maintaining and updating the Army's various equipments dealing with weapons.

The Officer making the request was the Commander of whatever Post that needed ammunition, and was determined at Post/Camp level on a yearly basis  - based upon what was still on hand from what the Army had supplied him with from the previous year.

It was then forwarded through the Department overseeing his area of operations and on to the War Department - who decided if a penurious Congress had allocated enough money to warrant 'all' of the proposed expenditure.

Often - it hadn't.

This accounts for the dearth of 'practice ammunition' and the subsequent decline in marksmanship practice.

Getting ammunition shipped to the various locations held by the Frontier Army was handled through the Quartermaster's contract teamsters, who handled the freighting, and it wasn't fast, by any means, since the ammunition had to be on-hand at the Depot in order for it to be shipped.

If it wasn't - it came from the Arsenal - usually via Rail.

Prior to 1873 - ammunition went out to those units who were issued the particular weapon, and with remarkably little confusion, but then the requests were pretty specific, and hand-written neatly.

After 1873 - the standardization of the Army's small arms and ammuntion aided greatly in its distribution as the new weapons made their way into issue.

That system only improved over time - but it certainly wasn't like today's military who can forecast ammunition expentiture for peacetime training purposes at least three years out - and even that is dependent upon allocation of monies - with many units only firing for 'Familiarization' - as opposed to 'Qualification' - every other year, if that.

Unless an individual Commander with experience and foresight had stockpiled ammunition in some way - quick re-supply or an emergency issue was pretty much out of the question, and the modern concept of long-range planning didn't seem to hold quite as much water in the rapidly-changing West, due to the continual movement of 'front lines'.

Damned difficult to plan against a fluid force with no fortifications to defend, you see.

Vaya,

Scouts Out!

[Fox Creek Kid]

As an interesting side note, the men in the Wagon Box Fight & Hayfield Fight had been issued the new Allin conversions in 50-70 in July 1867 (freighted in as St. George stated) and had not fired a single shot with them until the battles in August! Incredible!

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[matt45]

Ordnance   Spelling was never my strong suit

So what would happen when there was an unplanned expenditure of ammo- like the examples Fox Creek Kid brought up?  Did the Army rob Peter to pay Paul, so to speak, and raid another departments ammo?

And was there any kind of connect between Conressional authorization and real world use?  Even today, as St. George points out, ammo use forecasts are one of the hardest things to change in the short- term, and usually the first thing to get cut in a unit's annual budget (the next question would be did units have budgets, as in the present day?)

Thanks for the info

[Fox Creek Kid]

Actually, Ft. C.F. Smith & Ft. Kearney had received 100,000 rds. so there was no real fear of running low.

Here's a superb example of the supply chain:

http://www.oldammo.com/february06.htm

[St. George]

Every unit had a budget - and it was the responsibility of the Commander to ensure that the Army got full value for its dollar.

In doing this - he had guidelines that were both given to him, and taught to him as he rose through the ranks.

That's why 'all' junior Officers have all those additional duties - to prepare them to command.

As was stated - there was initially a relatively large amount of initial-issue ammuntion - the 100,000 round figure's fairly accurate.

Modern-day cross-levelling between units - given distances between Posts and Camps - was pretty much not done.

Plus - engagements weren't wild free-for-all affairs, since the soldier himself had an idea what the ammunition mules had in their panniers and wasn't profligate in his expenditure.

Remember - this was way before the concept of 'spray and pray' - so beloved by later generations of soldiery with unlimited ammunition access.

Vaya,

Scouts Out!