Field artillery

Field artillery is a category of mobile artillery used to support armies in the field. These weapons are specialized for mobility, tactical proficiency, long range, short range and extremely long range target engagement.

Until the early 20th century, field artillery were also known as foot artillery, for while the guns were pulled by beasts of burden (often horses), the gun crews would usually march on foot, thus providing fire support mainly to the infantry. This was in contrast to horse artillery, whose emphasis on speed while supporting cavalry units necessitated lighter guns and crews riding on horseback.

Whereas horse artillery has been superseded by self-propelled artillery, field artillery has survived to this day both in name and mission, albeit with motor vehicles towing the guns, carrying the crews and transporting the ammunition. Modern artillery has also advanced to rapidly deployable wheeled and tracked vehicles and precision delivered munitions capable of striking targets at ranges between 15 and 300 kilometers.

Field artillery (disambiguation)

Field artillery may refer to:

Swedish field artillery (early 18th century)

A Swedish foot (infantry) regiment during the 17th and 18th century was split into two battalions at the inception of a battle and light field artillery was usually put in the gaps that appeared between those battalions. This sort of artillery was categorized as regimental artillery.

Organization

The Swedish field artillery consisted of 48 artillery pieces of caliber three to six pounds. The caliber was determined by the weight of the projectile rather than on the diameter of the pipe. There were 18 large 48 pounds pieces as well, but those were not used as regimental field artillery, but for more strategic purposes.

Firing power

The artillery during the early 18th century was developed further by Carl Cronstedt. He combined the powder and projectile into one single thin wooden cartridge called "geschwinda" shots (fast shots) and thereby succeeding in increasing the firing power to 10-12 rounds per minute. In addition, he increased the explosive power of the projectile itself. The range of the 6 pounders was 600–700 meters and the 3 pounders 225 meters.