History of Byzantium in the 19th Century.

[miketr]

Anyone have any comments or what to make suggestions?  This history effects the Hapsburgs in particular so I would like a response from Sam at least.

Michael


1804: Serbian Insurrection Begins

1807 - 08: John XIII comes to the throne and attempts to restore autocratic rule.  Eventually dissolves the Senate and attempts to rule through the nobility.  A number of cities revolt and despite being banned the senate meets in Angora and declares that John is deposed.  In his place the Senate elects John's nephew Constantine, the 16th of that name.  While John holds the capital and nobles with their private forces rally to him most of the army support the Constantine along with the Senate. 

It soon becomes apparent that the private military forces of the nobility are simply no match for the regular army.  Still John controls the capital and its defenses so digging him out could be very expensive in terms of lives and damage to the Empire's First City.  After several months of negotiations John formally stepped down in favor of his Nephew and moved to a villa near Trebizond with a large annual payment to support the abdicated Emperor.

At once Constantine XVI embarks upon a system of reforms.  The last of the feudal military structure is swept away and while few nobles lose their titles most of them do lose the right to maintain private armies.

1815: Serbs Insurrection turns to overt revolt.  With threat of Hapsburg intervention, Serbia is granted Autonomy but foreign relations remain in the hands of the Imperial Government.

1828: Constantine begins a large naval build up including the construction of the The King of Glory (ὁ Bασιλεὺς τῆς Δόξης) (one of the titles of Jesus), the largest Ship of the Line ever built.  The 128 gun First Rate served for many years and is now a depot hulk in Constantinople used as the head quarters of the Constantinople fleet district.

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/37/Ottoman_ship_of_the_line_Mahmudiye.png

1831: Byzantium Demands increased protection of pilgrims to holy sites in the Holy Land sets off latest war between Byzantium and Egyptian Sultanate.  A pair of naval battles quickly destroys Egyptian Fleet and has Egypt's ports under blockade.  A grinding campaign sees Byzantine Army advance into Syria and Lebanon by years end.

1832: In bid to bring war to quick end Byzantine Fleet transports an invasion force to Alexandria in Egypt.  Persia, Hapsburgs and others alarmed at possible collapse of Egypt make calls for negotiated end of conflict.  Also Hapsburgs start to so decent among Romanians and Serbians.  With Capture of Cairo and collapse of Egyptian Forces in Syria it looks like Byzantium might have won the war.  Then Serbia declares full independence and makes sweeping claims in Balkans and Romanians revolt; both nations have extensive Hapsburg aid.  At the same time Persia joins war on Egypts side.

1833: Byzantine army in Syria is moved to face Persian invasion and reinforces intended for Army in Egypt are sent to try to restore situation in Balkans.  Popular uprising occurs in Egypt and Byzantium's army is only able to control the coastal cities.  As situation worsens on other fronts the army in Egypt is withdrawn all together but as Byzantium's troops leave the major cities of Egypt are left in flames as the cities are ordered burned.

1834: Serbians are driven back and Romanian revolt is contained but it is a stalemate verse Persia and the Hapsburgs are showing signs of entering the war directly.  The Empire cannot face so many enemies and looks for an exit to the war.  The treaty of Constantinople is signed.  Byzantium gains a pair of provinces from Egypt, status quo vs. Persia, full Serbian Independence is confirmed and the Romanian principalities gain autonomy. 

1839: Constantine XVI passes and is reign is viewed in a mixed light.  A number of reforms done internally for the Empire and nation was stable.  On the foreign front Serbia is fully lost and hold over Romanian territory weakened.  While Egypt was humbled but only a little territory to show for it.
Andronikos VIII eldest son of Constantine takes the throne.

1848: Revolutions sweep Europe but only have minor effects in Byzantium after some protests.  The demands for reform were side tracked into a 2 year debate in Senate that produces only minor changes to voting laws.
Russian enters cycle of local revolts and protests against Tsar.

1854: Great Russian War

Tsar Nicholas I attempts to distract his nobles and people with a foreign adventure and proclaims protectorate over the Romanian Principalities.  Byzantium issues ultimatum to Russia which is refused and war follows.  The Byzantine fleet destroyers Russian Black Sea fleet and support armies advance up Black Sea coast. 

Worries over Russian adventurism allow Byzantium to gather a strange collection of allies and a hundreds of thousands of foreign troops join the campaign.  Russian instability deepens and as Russian armies melt under pressure.

1855: Aleksandr II takes the Throne of Russia but there is no respite as enemy armies overrun most of Ukraine and Poland rises in full revolt.  Byzantium proclaim annexation of Crimea and this nearly shatters alliance as other powers demand territory at the expense of Russia. 

1856: The logistical limit of invading armies has been meet and the war simply cannot continue anymore.  Aleksandr II seeks peace but squabbling over the spoils divides allies.  The eventually solution in true Solomonic fashion pleases no one.  Poland and Ukraine are split off from Russia and princely house of little note is put on the throne of the new nation.

1861: Railroad crosses Anatolian Plateau and connects Eastern and Western borders of Empire.

Also Andronikos VIII pass and his reign is viewed on today in very favorable terms and his son Manuel VIII takes the throne.  The new emperor embarks on a new round of internal reform to the government of the Empire, including voting reform and increased autonomy for minorities.

1865: Persia declares war over border disputes.  Making use of new repeating rifles and railroads Byzantine armies mash Persian army in 10 weeks and all of Mesopotamia is occupied.  The humiliating treaty of Baghdad sees this wealthy territory handed over to the Empire.  Manuel had been against the war and against the peace that followed but deferred to his ministers.  One thing Manuel was able to do was not have the new territory directly integrated into the empire, instead it was held as a protectorate. 

1876: Manuel VIII passes and in his will orders the Senate to hold Plebiscite in all territories with heavy minorities to see if they will stay in the empire.  This command throws the empire into turmoil as many wish to hold onto the territories.   

The new Emperor Alexios V, was not only against his father's final command to the senate but was a reactionary to boot.  Alexios V attempts to use the crises to restore personal rule of the empire.  It looks like civil war is in the making but Alexios suddenly dies.  Many claim that the Emperor was murdered and Manuel VIII second son Matthew V takes the throne.  The year of three emperors is a chaotic one but eventually it is decided that Manuel VIII final will is to be honored.  Bosnia, Montenegro, the Romanian principalities and Mesopotamia all vote to go free.  Mesopotamia quickly rejoins the Persian Empire but violent repression of Christians in Mesopotamia angers many in the empire and a counter pogrom vs. Muslims sweeps the Empire.

Matthew V has continued his father's program of reforms.

[Sachmle]

Looks good to me. No real "direct" involvement on my side, just some "support" here and there..sounds very Austrian.

[miketr]

I figure the 16th - 18th centuries were the war years between the two nations.

Michael

[ctwaterman]

Hey we still have the last 20 years of the 19th Century and all of the 20th.... so you have time.

Charles

[miketr]

A copy of my Army Forum Post.  Anyone have any comments on the history of Byzantine Small Arms?  I will do something on pistols sooner or later.


Infantry Weapons of Byzantine Army

Armory Musket Model Date Various between early 1700's and 1835

Known simply as the Armory Musket it saw many incremental improvements over its long service life.  The typical armory musket weighs 4.8 kg or 10.5 lb weapon fired a 18mm musket ball with a flintlock action.  As the Armory Musket is a smooth bore weapon the drill manual called for 3 shots a minute.  A very skilled soldier could fire up to 4 times but most soldiers only managed 2 rounds a minute.  Effective range was normally under 100 meters vs. anything other than mass targets.

The Armory Musket has been widely exported and copied across the world.  Both Persia and Egypt copied the weapon for their own armed forces.  The 1831-34 war vs. Egypt, Persia and the Balkan revolts was the last major war of the Armory Musket.

The Armory Musket was discontinued with the introduction of Percussion Cap Weapons in 1835.

Armory Rifle Model 1802

First rifled weapon to enter into wide spread use in the Byzantine Armed forces.  The Armory made use of a 16mm musket ball.  The rifle was a very temperamental weapon when first introduced and required special training.  First of all barrel fouling required a special cleaning kit be issued with the rifle.  Second to make use of the increased range and accuracy of the weapon special training is required.  As such the rifle was only issued to picked units such as the Imperial Guard and Light Infantry.  In skilled hands 3 shots a minute and fire out to 500 meters were possible. 

The rifle was discontinued with the introduction of Percussion Cap Weapons in 1835.

Armory Musket / Armory Rifle Model 1835

The Percussion Cap allowed for the possibility of weapons to be fired in rain or dry conditions.  Also a new weapon would allow the simplification of production and logistics by trying to standardize between the smooth bore and rifle weapons.  The result was the Model 1835 Musket and Model 1835 Rifle.  Other than the barrel the two weapons were identical.  The Rifle had the barrel slightly bored out for the rifle grooves.  The weapon was a very light weight at 4.1 kg or 9 lbs.  2 to 3 rounds a minute were typical between either smooth bore or rifled variety.  The musket was used out to the normal 100 meters or less with a max range of 200 meters vs. mass targets.  The rifle could routinely be used out to 300 meters or even 500 meters in skilled hands. 

As with the Model 1802 only picked units made use for of the Rifled version.

Both Rifled and Musket saw some use in the Russian war but were quickly replaced by the Model 1851.

Armory Rifle Model 1851

The gun is a muzzle loading rifled musket firing a Minié ball and like the Model 1835's it replaced used a Percussion Cap.  Also for the first time rifled weapon is to be standard for all infantry forces of the army.  The M1851 fires a large 15mm, 34g lead round using black powder.  The drill manual calls for 2 shots a minute with a skilled soldier and the M1851 weighs 4.3 kg or 9.5 lbs.  Maximum range is out to 1,800 meters vs. mass targets; typically the weapon would be used at well under the maximum range, normally 500 meters or less.

The default weapon of Byzantine forces in the Great Russian war of 1854 - 57.

Armory Rifle Model 1858

The rifle is a Bolt Action weapon and has no magazine; each cartridge is hand feed into the breach.  The M1858 fires a 11mm, 25g lead bullet in a paper cartridge using black powder.  The rifle is capable of 10 - 12 shots a minute and weighs 4.5 kg or 10 lbs.  Maximum range is out to 1,800 meters vs. mass targets.  Besides the greatly increased rate of fire the new weapon allows troops to fight while on the ground and to not have to stand to load the weapon.

The M1858 went on to great renown in the Byzantine - Persian War of 1865.  During the war Byzantine Troops equipped with the rifle destroyed Persian armies equipped with rifled muskets.

Armory Rifle Model 1867

Metallic cartridges are adopted for general use by the Byzantine Armed Forces.  The M1858 rifle is adapted to use the new round but in all other respects is the same weapon.

Armory Rifle Model 1868

As part of an upgrade program to make use of the large numbers of the large numbers of M1851 rifles in storage and the new metallic cartridges.  A hinged breechblock was added to make use of the new ammunition.  The new rifle was capable of up to 8 - 10 shots a minute and all other details is the same as the old M1851.  Reserve and militia units are equipped with the M1868   
     

[miketr]

Any comments?  Recall again this is flavor text, tech levels matter and not what I say I have. 

Michael


Byzantine Artillery in the 19th Century

At the start of the 19th century artillery was broken down into three categories. Foot, Horse and Siege guns.


Foot Artillery came in three sizes 4, 8 and 12 pounders all made of bronze.  Also there was the 24-pound howitzer firing explosive shell.


Horse Artillery had short version of the 4 and 8 pounders with decreased accuracy because of the reduced barrel length. 


The Siege Train had special long-range 12-pound guns along with heavier guns such as 24, 32 and 64 pounder battering guns.  All such guns were made of cast iron rather than bronze.   


Imperial Artillery operated in 6 gun batteries for Field and Horse.  The standard ratio of guns was 4.5 guns per 1,000 men.  The combat unit at this time was a Brigade with 4 regiments and an Artillery regiment of 3 batteries.  The regiment would have two 4-lb batteries and one 8-lb battery.  The 12 pound field artillery and howitzer was a Corps level asset and typically organized into heavy field artillery regiments of two batteries of 12-lb. guns and one 24-lb howitzer.


The Siege train was rarely setup in field operations with the exception of the 12-lb long guns as some commanders would try to use them in a counter battery role to suppress enemy artillery.  This attempt was always problematic because of the extreme weight of the guns, nearly twice the weight of a normal foot 12-lb gun.


Things remained much as they were till the second army reform of Constantine XVI in 1821.  While most of Europe had discarded the 4-lb guns in favor of 6-lb guns Byzantium had soldered on with tried and trusted lighter guns.  In the reorganization all 4-lb and 8-lb guns were ordered replaced 6-lbs cannon.  Still when the Byzantine Armies marched to war vs. Egypt in 1831 nearly half of the army was still equipped according to the old standards.  By the end of the war the Imperial Army had converted to the new standard.


This setup remained largely static till the Great Russian War of 1854-57.  Three things changed the balance of artillery.  The first was the introduction of shell guns in the late 1840's by the Navy and second the increasing use of rifled muskets.  During the early stages of the war were several incidents of Russian Rifle units cutting apart 8-lb and some times 12-lb gun crews.  As the war dragged on such incidents decreased as Russia ran out of highly trained riflemen.  The third change was the introduction of breech loading artillery.  Last saw the introduction in small numbers of rifled artillery.  All of this combined to throw the entire Byzantine Artillery system into flux and a large increase in size of artillery of all types but especially of siege artillery.  By the end of the war saw some units equipped with new 75mm rifled breech loading artillery, others using the Ordnance M1854 light 12-lb guns and still others using pre-war guns with cast dates of 1830's or earlier.  Siege guns had grown up to 250mm rifles firing 300-lb shells and 330mm howitzers.  Several of the large M1855 siege guns took part in the siege of Kiev as the war drew to a close in 1856. 


The rapid series of changes and confusing state of the Artillery Park called for a number of changes.  Also with the big jump in gun sizes and rushed wartime production there were many reports of guns bursting from a number of causes.  In 1858 an Ordinance Review board makes a series of sweeping recommendations to modernize the Armies Artillery and its production.


All guns moved from the old Imperial Weight system to the new Metric Muzzle Diameter system.  All guns to be made of iron.
 

6-lb cannon were replaced by 57mm breech loading rifled artillery, the 57mm M1857.
12-lb cannon were replaced by 75mm breech loading rifled artillery, the 75mm M1855.
A new heavy field gun based upon the old naval 18-lb cannon, a 90mm breech loading rifled artillery, 90mm M1858.
The standard Siege Artillery piece was the 60-lb now 130mm breech loading rifled artillery, 130mm M1858.

Heavy Siege and Fortress Artillery all remained muzzleloaders to reduce cost and because of high chamber pressures made breech loading weapons impractical.  This combined with the need for special gear to load the guns and the heavy weight of the shells and the guns themselves made them very slow firing.

100-lb replaced by 160mm M1856
150-lb replaced by 200mm M1857
300-lb replaced by 250mm M1859


This setup and the new Armory Rifle Model 1858 are what destroyed the Persian Army in the 10-week campaign of 1865.
 

Howitzers / motors had fallen somewhat out of favor and were mostly used as special coast defense weapons and were not used by the army in this time period.  The 1870's had seen two new inventions the first being introduction of steel as material to make artillery and the advent of the Multi-Gun.  With the heavy investment in the cast iron rifled breechloaders there has been some resistance to the implementation of the new guns.  As of yet only a few key units have been equipped with the new steel artillery but steel does offer interesting possibilities for heavier guns, in particular allowing breech loaders of much larger size.


The Mult-Gun has 75 Armory Rifle Model 1867 clamped together in 5 x 15 setup.  A steel plate has 75 rounds that are locked into create a sealed breech.  A crank of a screw fires all of the cartridges at once, tests have shown that the gun can be reloaded a minute with a sustained rate of fire of 300 rounds per minute.  It is intended to replace the 57mm M1873 light field gun with the new M1877 Multi Gun as the light field gun has questionable firepower and range.   

[Darman]

The Mult-Gun has 75 Armory Rifle Model 1867 clamped together in 5 x 15 setup.  A steel plate has 75 rounds that are locked into create a sealed breech.  A crank of a screw fires all of the cartridges at once, tests have shown that the gun can be reloaded a minute with a sustained rate of fire of 300 rounds per minute.  It is intended to replace the 57mm M1873 light field gun with the new M1877 Multi Gun as the light field gun has questionable firepower and range.   

Ahh, the mitrelieuse (sp?).  An interesting gun, in my humble opinion it should have been more effective, however it was used ineffectively.  Then again, hindsight is 20:20

All in all, interesting reading, and inspiring me to attempt the same (I got dibs on Springfield Armory!)

[miketr]

Yes a Mitrailleuse but again while it or the Gatling are possible in this time period they will not be used as they could be with 20 : 20 hindsight.  Its flavor text and army tech level is key.  They will be just a novelty that future generations will look back and say, what if.

Thanks for the words and best of luck on your own write up.

Michael 

[Tanthalas]

Yes a Mitrailleuse but again while it or the Gatling are possible in this time period they will not be used as they could be with 20 : 20 hindsight.  Its flavor text and army tech level is key.  They will be just a novelty that future generations will look back and say, what if.

Thanks for the words and best of luck on your own write up.

Michael

im all for Fluf, just like me planing to use the potato digger, and lever action musket.

[miketr]

Potato digger and lever action musket?

Michael

[Darman]

There was a bayonet designed to be used as an entrenching tool... maybe that?

[Tanthalas]

Potato digger and lever action musket?

Michael

Potato Digger http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M1895_Colt-Browning_machine_gun

Lever Action Musket http://gunsofold.com/1873_musket.html

Both are John Browning developments.

[miketr]

It has a rifled barrel, fires metallic cartridges and has a tube magazine so its anyone of the late 19th century lever action guns of which the Winchester Fire Arms company was the most famous manufacture. The Potato digger MG is a slightly later contemporary of the Maxim Gun.

I would say for flavor text a lever action gun is fine in either 1860 or 1880 infantry tech but a gas operated MG is 1880 or 1895 tech.  Up to 1905 or so gas operated MG's are clearly a novelty and there isn't the tactics to really use them correctly as they could be with 20 : 20 hindsight.

On the other hand because of size of a Gatling or Mitrailleuse type weapons they get used as a type of light field artillery.  People aren't sure exactly what to do with them either and worse because of their size the options for doing anything with them ARE more limited.

Michael   

[Nobody]

Why do you keep talking about "20 : 20 hindsight"?

[miketr]

Its important to look at weapons of the time period as people in the time period would and not as we would.  We have the benefit of looking BACKWARDS and have access to what came later.  So people will to different degrees know what does and what doesn't work.  What is a dead end and what isn't a dead end.  This is what I mean by 20:20 hindsight.  For example any type of rapid fire weapon even something as clumsy as a Gatling could have massive effects on the battlefield.  Also from an engineering point of view once smokeless powder comes about there is nothing really preventing nations from creating semi-auto or full auto battle rifles.  People of the time didn't know what exactly do to with the weapons of the time period let alone weapons that were technically possible but were not built or at least not built in large numbers.  All such weapons are before there time.

Note that for Byzantium its Mitrailleuse is considered a type of artillery and will be deployed and handled as such.  IE back away from the front lines, on elevations so it fires downward.  So the effects of what the weapon COULD generate will be largely blunted, even though it will be general use.  There will be battles were circumstances create massive body counts, etc but those would be exceptions and not rule.  Those advocating different uses of the weapon will not well viewed by the militaries establishment and largely side lined.  Such is the nature of most very large organizations.  It will be another generation that takes the potential of the concept or device and sees it taken to the next step.

Michael