Tagging artillery units

• by cyngast moderator

  What's the best way to tag the phrase "came into action" when tagging an artillery unit? It seems to be a similar situation to going into the line for infantry units because it doesn't indicate actual firing.

  I'm tagging 42nd Brigade R.F.A. and on August 25 the diary states "The 41st Battery and 1 section of the 29th Battery came into action...but did not fire."

  Also, do the individual batteries in the brigade correspond to companies in an infantry unit, at least for purposes of tagging?

  Posted January 31, 2015 6:43 PM

• by HeatherC moderator

  Not really sure how to answer the "coming into action" one - obviously if it involves movement of the guns then you can tag it as that but if it's just getting ready for action at the guns but not actually firing then I'm not sure it can be tagged at all. It's a bit like an infantry unit "standing to" but not firing at anything.

  Yes an artillery battery is equivalent to an infantry company or a cavalry squadron.

  Posted January 31, 2015 9:33 PM

• by cyngast moderator

  As far as I can tell, "coming into action" seems to mean putting the guns into position to fire. In the example I gave above, the unit was involved in the retreat from Mons, August 1914, and so they were generally moving but had stopped to try to fire at the enemy. However, they did not fire because they never had any actual targets appear.

  BTW, I had noticed that you hadn't been posting anything for a while. It's good to have you back!

  Posted February 1, 2015 6:14 PM

• by ral104 moderator, scientist

  I'll second that!

  'Coming into action' is interesting. I've always tagged it as 'Firing' as I've never come across a situation where they've come into action, but specifically said they didn't fire.

  Posted February 2, 2015 10:09 AM

• by HeatherC moderator

  Sounds fair enough and I agree with your definition of what it actually means. Context is everything and if you're reading it and think it's worthy of a tag in that context then as you are an experienced tagger - go for it! And yes I've been very busy at my day job but do try to pop in here when I can!

  Posted February 2, 2015 1:20 PM

• by cyngast moderator

  As I'm continuing on with this unit, I'm using my best judgement as to how to tag those "came into action" references according to the context. It does appear that sometimes it does indicate they were firing, but in other spots it seems that they were at the guns and the guns were ready but no firing actually occurred. Those situations, which are somewhat like "standing to" for an infantry battalion, seem to occur mostly when the unit is fairly stationary, as they were around La Bassee in Oct-Nov 1914.

  I've tagged a couple of other artillery units, but hadn't encountered this distinction between coming into action and firing before.

  Posted February 4, 2015 1:37 AM

• by ral104 moderator, scientist

  Me too. Useful to know for future reference!

  Posted February 4, 2015 7:44 PM