- tern, have frequently been recommended. Their usefulness in
difficult country and in operations against the enemy's flank and rear cannot be denied. In minor operations, if provided with ample ammunition and advancing on side roads, they can hamper the reconnaissance of the enemy, secure the flanks of their own force, ascertain the probable extent of the prospective battlefield, and finally, having made a skillful lodgment, they can become very annoying to the hostile artillery. In a large battle the necessary elbow room for such employment is lacking. To form picked men into special organizations, as is done in Russia, is always of doubtful value. The constant transfer of their best men to the mounted infantry during the second part of the South African war was fatal to the British infantry battalions. An organization cannot dispense with its good men; it needs them to replace wounded non-commissioned officers. While everything goes without a hitch, the withdrawal of good men from an organization is of little importance; the drawbacks to this procedure become apparent, however, when the line begins to waver, when, in the absence of officers, only the example of the courageous men prevents the weak-kneed from running away. Our regulations properly appreciate the importance of psychological impressions during critical combat situations; they state: "The man who feels his courage and coolness going, in the excitement of battle, should look toward his officers. Should they have fallen, he will find plenty of non-commissioned officers and brave privates, whose example will revive his courage." (Par. 268 German I. D. R.).
If it becomes necessary to despatch a stronger infantry force on a mission of minor importance, it will usually be better to detail an entire company than to improvise a detachment whose leader would know his men only imperfectly.
Before the 95th Infantry (French) made its attack on the brewery of
l'Amitié (south of Noisseville), on August 31st, 1870, a reconnoitering
