the field artillery journal - Fort Sill - U.S. Army

THE FIELD ARTILLERY JOURNAL
condition of the roads to be travelled and the watering places to
be met with on the following day.
The battery takes the road, say at six A.M., and at a walk,
including hourly halts, it should cover about three and one-half
miles per hour. For a march of twenty miles about six hours
would be consumed at this gait. This length of time is too great
for such a distance; horses are required to sustain the weight of
harness, rider and pack for too long a period. Under these
conditions young, unseasoned horses soon begin to lose flesh,
interfere in front and stumble. It has been demonstrated that
when a battery is marched as fast as five miles per hour on fair
roads the horses hold their condition better and there is less
trouble from galls if the distance of twenty miles is not
exceeded.
The method of march is laid down in regulations and is the
result of experience. The gait of course must depend upon the
condition of the roads.
In some organizations of the regular service it is customary
at the halts to unsnap the collars, place them on the saddles
and then massage and dry the shoulders. There is no good
reason to be advanced from a veterinary or a military point of
view for such a procedure. On the one hand the shoulders are
not subject, like the back beneath the saddle, to constant
pressure, for in draft the collar oscillates to such an extent that
when the traces are of equal length practically but one
shoulder bears the strain at each stride depending on which
fore limb is advanced at the moment. This being evident it
follows that a given shoulder is practically subject to collar
pressure but half of the time except at the moment of starting,
in traversing heavy roads or in climbing hills when the
animals step short, hold the shoulders practically rigid and pull
upon both traces equally. If these statements are accepted as
true it will be admitted that there is little interference with the
blood circulation of the skin of the shoulders beneath the collar
and that the necessity for massaging is not apparent. It may be
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