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[212] for, on the one hand, a road can only be made available for a certain number of wagons, while on the other, even if several practicable roads be opened, an army cannot be accompanied by an unlimited number of wagons without embarrassing all its movements. At the beginning of the war the American soldier consumed nearly three pounds of food per day; if to this we add ammunition of every kind, personal accoutrements, and all that is necessary for the maintenance of troops, it will be readily admitted that the average weight of articles to be transported for the necessities of a large American army is about four pounds daily to each man, without counting the food for horses and mules, which amounts to about twenty-five pounds for each animal. The American wagon, drawn by six mules, carries a load of 2000 pounds, sufficient, therefore, to supply 500 men, provided it can make the trip daily, going and returning, between the army and its depots. If the distance to be traveled is such as to require a whole day's march, one day being lost in returning empty, it will only be able to supply 500 men every other day, or 250 daily. To go a distance of two days march from its base of operations is a very small matter for an army that is manoeuvring in front of the enemy, and yet, according to this computation, it will require four wagons to supply 500 men with provisions, or eight for 1000, and consequently 800 for 100,000 men. If this army of 100,000 men has 16,000 cavalry and artillery horses, a small number comparatively speaking, 200 more wagons will be required to carry their daily forage, and, therefore, 800 to transport it to a distance of two days march. These 1600 wagons are, in their turn, drawn by 9600 mules, which, also consuming twenty-five pounds during each of the three days out of four they are away from the depots, require 360 wagons more to carry their forage; these 360 wagons are drawn by 2400 animals, and in order to transport the food required by the latter, 92 additional wagons are necessary. Adding twenty wagons more, for general purposes, we shall find that 2000 wagons, drawn by 12,000 animals, are strictly necessary to victual an army of 100,000 men and 16,000 horses at only two days march from its base of operations. In the same proportion, if
Philadelphia, Jos. H. Coates and co., 1876.
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