Persian Invasion of 480 BC - articles

[Sean Manning]

I would rather say the situation in the 18th century saw soldiers who were treated carefully (if not humanely) by their masters. After the 30 Years War, armies become professional; the soldiers are low class people, but they have to be paid, even when not in use; which makes them expensive assets. They were harshly disciplined, but not starved. This cost helped to limit the size of armies. Conversely, in the 19th century, armies were raised by nationalism and conscription (which went hand in hand), it was the duty of men to serve and not to desert; so you didn't have to treat them so well. You could draft large numbers of men, and pay wasn't so much of an issue, and if you lost some, you could draft some more. This allowed for larger armies, and more wastage of manpower.

I can't find my sources (several were PDF articles which I have since deleted) and this is off-topic so I won't get into a full discussion of this. Suffice it to say that I agree treatment varied, especially with time and army, and that good generals were stingy with the lives and health of their men outside of battles. Convincing junior officers to do the same, however, was often harder, especially since undersupporting your men could be proffitable. Earlier in the period states often raised armies larger than they could feed and pay for and expected looting to make up the difference.