Artillery elephants

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Also see

• Commissariat, or Army Supply. This Department was responsible for elephants.

Photographs and drawings

• Photographs of elephant armour from 1600 with a description Royal Armouries, Leeds, UK
• "An Artillery Elephant on Duty", hand-coloured lithograph by Captain C. Gold; 1799 from British Voices from South Asia Louisiana State University
• Photograph of a Royal Artillery elephant battery at Lucknow 1858 Victoria's Wars, page 26 by Ian Frederick William Beckett 1998 Google Books. The same photograph is also available at the National Army Museum with these details
• Drawing of "Peshawur Mountain train in the line of March 1877", showing guns loaded on the elephants' backs. flickr.com
• Drawing of "An elephant battery advances through the mountains" from The Battle of Charasiab 6th October 1879, 2nd Afghan War (scroll down) Britishbattles.com
• Photograph of "Elephant Battery 12/9 R.A. in action - Morar Gwalior, 1881" from Major Hawkshaw’s India Album Harappa.com
• Drawing of a "Shaft Elephant of Heavy Field Battery Gun (from the Artillery Manual)" , between pages lii and liii of the Introduction in A manual of the diseases of the elephant and of his management and uses by John Henry Steel 1885 Archive.org
• Drawings of an elephant battery at Tongo, Burma 1885 with guns loaded on the elephants’ backs. old-print.com (archived page) Originally from The Graphic Saturday, October 24, 1885
• Photograph of "The Elephant Battery, Artillery Lines, Peshawar" c.1880's from this page of Prof Fran Pritchett’s Indian Routes website
• Photograph of "Elephant battery of heavy artillery along the Khyber Pass at Campbellpur, 1895" with details Library of Congress
• Photograph Elephant Battery Tirah Campaign 1897 bonhams.com. Click on the small picture to enlarge. From an album of views of the Tirah Campaign. Probably taken at the same time as the following photograph.
• Photograph of an elephant battery during the Pathan Revolt 1897, with guns loaded on the elephant backs. The British Army on Campaign 4 1882-1902, page 18 by Michael Barthorp 1988 Google Books
• Photograph of an elephant heavy field battery at Mhow,1897 Indiasfirstwarofindependance1857.blogspot.com
• Photograph of "Elephant Battery on Parade, Jhansi, India c 1899" Staffordshire Past-Track
• Photograph of "Elephant Battery Gwalior c 1935" Heavy artillery is transported to a hill station by a team of Indian elephants. Corbis Images. Gwalior was a Princely State
• An elephant battery: Photograph 1 and photograph 2 from a group of photographs, University of California. Identified as a British Heavy Battery of around 1895, refer External links below.
• Photograph: Battery division elephant c 1895. superstock.com. An Indian mahout (elephant handler) dressed in military uniform and turban sits on the shoulders of an elephant working in the Heavy Battery division of the Royal Artillery.

Historical books online

• This extract includes wording from a 1784 book and refers to the skill of the elephants in the Army of Hyder Ali. "It can hardly be imagined how useful these elephants are, nor with what skill and intelligence they do their work". "Baggage of the Indian Army" Calcutta Review, Volume 11 January-June 1849, page 445
• This extract is about the pushing power of an elephant The Calcutta Review, Volume 8, July-December 1847 page 222
• "Elephant" Aide-mémoire to the military sciences: Framed from contributions of officers of the different services, Volume 1, page 404 Edited by a Committee of the Corps of Royal Engineers 1853 Google Books
• "Elephant Battery" The Musical World, Volumes 19-20 1858, page 392 originally appeared in the Illustrated London News. Google Books
• An account of how a reluctant elephant is made to swim across a river: page 452 Camp and Cantonment‬: ‪A Journal of Life in India in 1857-1859 to which is added A Short Account of the Pursuit of the Rebels in Central India by Majot Paget, RHA by Mrs Leopold Paget 1865 Google Books
• An elephant tale, 1858 Round-about Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy by Frank Richard Stockton, page 9, first published 1872 Google Books
• "Notes on elephant carriage and steel mountain batteries employed in Abyssinia", page 191 an Appendix to "The Abyssinian Expedition" pages 167-202 Minutes of proceedings of the Royal artillery institution, Volume 6 1870 Google Books
• "Notes on Elephants and their Transport by Railway" by Capt H Wilberforce Clarke RE from Professional Papers on Indian Engineering Second Series Volume 8 1879 "Notes on Elephants", page 243 "Report on the Transportation of Elephants by Railway", page 289
• "The Elephant as used in modern Armies", page xxvi (Introduction) A manual of the diseases of the elephant and of his management and uses by John Henry Steel 1885 Archive.org
• This link advises an elephant battery at Jhansi was abolished c 1903, and the elephants sold. Chota Nagpur, a little-known province of the empire, page 200 by Francis Bradley Bradley-Birt, first published 1903, Google Books.
• An elephant story Toomai of the Elephants from The Jungle Book may be read online from the page Rudyard Kipling. The story is set at the conclusion of the annual hunt for wild elephants, for the Government of India.

External links

• Elephant Armour Pete’s Blog 2009/07/25. Archived page with more images.
• Glossary of Royal Artillery. Terms and Abbreviations (Historical and Modern) by Philip Jobson. Includes the entry 'Bail Battery'. These were Heavy Batteries in India in the 1890's comprised of Elephant drawn guns. "At the beginning ot the 20th Century, with the introduction of Breech-Loading guns for the Heavy Batteries, the Elephants and Bullocks were replaced with teams of eight heavy horses" 7fd-regt-raa-association.com. Note, this is a download, and depending on your browser, you may need to locate in your downloads folder.
• Elephant Artillery sites.google.com "The Elephant Batteries were also known as Bail Batteries, Bail being the Hindustani for oxen"
• Victorian Wars Forum thread by Frogsmile which dates and identifies two photographs (refer above) and provides much additional information about elephant batteries.
• "Britain’s Fighting Elephants" by H J Chuter Everybody’s Magazine August 1900 together with additional images. gallimafry.blogspot.com.
• "Heavy Batteries in India" by Lt-Col Roger Ayers www.kipling.org.uk
• Thread about guns carried on elephants' backs. theminiaturespage.com
• Bringing up elephants: 1812 book in the Saraswati Mahal Library by Pradeep Chakravarthy Madras Musings Vol. XXI No. 6, July 1-15, 2011
• Elephants over the centuries by A. Raman Madras Musings Vol. XXII No. 4, June 1-15, 2012
• Catalogue entry Liddell Hart Military Archives King’s College London Block, Col Arthur Hugh (1859-1931) Four copy photographs of 9 Western Div (Heavy Bde) and 72 Company (Heavy Bde), Royal Garrison Artillery, in India, showing elephant battery manoeuvres and parade, 1898-1900. kingscollections.org
• Newspaper article "Elephant Artillery. The Most Curious Corps In The British Army".The Colac Herald Friday 25 June 1915 trove.nla.gov.au
• Elephants at war, in Burma, World War 2 from "China - Burma - India: Remembering the Forgotten Theater of World War II"