One of the things that I’m researching a the moment is how the rear area horse lines were managed and by how many soldiers.
The issue comes from an article that stated that the RE Field Troops and Squadrons where completely ineffective as they were hampered by having to look after their horses and as such could only release a fraction of their strength for Engineering tasks.
The basis for this argument is the 1 in 4 rule, which was for when mounted troop dismounted to work or fight then 1 man in each 4 must stay with the horses.
Now this is correct as that is the ratio for horse holders and also it is the manageable number of horses that a man can manage when riding.
The issue is that the author of the article has applied the same logic to when the horses are in horse lines, on a picket line or in a fixed encampment. Where you have these types of locations the horse lines can be managed very easily by just a few men from each troop and the bulk of the unit would then be available for other works.
The other issue that the article has is very bias against the Cavalry and regularly compares a Cavalry Division against an Infantry Division in out put terms while they are very different, particularly in Manpower and especially in Sapper resources. this is simply a case of comparing apples to oranges.
Its also interesting that the author has taken a snapshot of figures from what appears to be late 1914 and used these as the figures for the whole war, which is particularly naughty as the RE Field Squadrons at this point in time were in a significant state of flux with manpower as they used the existing 5 troops and the Sqn HQ to create 2 under strength Squadrons.
So it’s something that has got my dander up and I’m now digging into books and manuals. Nowt like getting a wee bit narked to get you researching!