Alexander : a history of the origin and growth of the art of war from ...

EXCEPTIONAL LOSSES. 2479.1 per cent. ; the Iowa Brigade, out of 1,883 men, lost 162 killed, or 8.6per cent.At the Wilderness, the Vermont Brigade, out of 2,800 men, lost 195kUled, or 7 per cent.Or, to take some large armies of this century —:At Borodino, the French, out of 133,000 men, are reckoned to havelost 4,400 killed, or 3.3 per cent. ; the Russians, out of 132,000 men, arereckoned to have lost 4,500 killed, or 3.4 per cent.At Waterloo, the Allies, out of 72,000 men, are reckoned to have lost3,600 killed, or 5 per cent. ; the French, out of 80,000 men, are reckonedto have lost 4,100 killed, or 5 per cent.At Gettysburg, the Federals, out of 82,000 men, actually lost 3,063killed, or 3.8 per cent. ;the Confederates, out of 60,000 men, actuallylost 2,665 killed, or 4.4 per cent.At Gravelotte, the Germans, out of 146,000 men, actually lost 4,449killed, or 3 per cent.The term " killed " does not include those who die of theirwounds. The men, for instance, in the Federal army atGettysburg, who were killed and died of their wounds (mostof them within a week) numbered five thousand two hundredand ninety-one men or 6.4 per cent. But to keep thesame method of figuring for all cases, only those killed inthe battle are counted, viz. : three thousand and sixty-three.The figures of killed at Borodino and Waterloo cannot bevouched for, but they are not far from the truth.The following deductions can be made from the abovefigures. The larger the force the less the percentage ofkilled ;principally because a smaller percentage of men canbe actually got into fighting contact. In bodies exceedingsixty thousand men, the loss in hilled, in a very stubbornlycontested battle, may be some four per cent. ; in bodies offrom ten thousand to twenty thousand men, five per cent. ; inbodies of from two thousand to five thousand men, seven anda half per cent. ; in regiments of from one thousand to two