Chapter 37: War Preparations

Kyle walks into the storeroom, crosses it, and opens the door to the office. KK, War Bonnet, Nadia, and Larry are right behind him. With the last of them through the portal they break the contact link. In a few minutes they’re armed and out in the compound with Kyle looking for Nathan while KK takes War Bonnet over to get him settled in the stable.

Nathan is in the smithy beside the stable, so he’s soon found. Seeing Kyle, Nathan smiles and says, “Lord Kyle, it’s good you’re here. There’s much to discuss. We need to visit the map room first.” Nathan leads the way to the room built onto the side of the main house.

This is a big room with several tables roped together in it. The tops are painted to represent the area around Shiloh. When he enters the room Kyle can see some changes. A few more tables and details have been added. Nathan proceeds to use a stick to point at the tables as he says, “Lord Kyle, as you can see we’ve added to the map of Shiloh. Where it was once almost a rectangle with an area cut out for Riverview and the lands beyond it Shiloh is now an unusual shape, but with simplified borders. Several days after you left visitors from the towns of Collective and Sable arrived and asked to be taken under the protection of Shiloh. They accept you as their Lord and pay levies the same as the others. About ten days after that a delegation from Riverview asked the same. Since then numerous farms and towns have asked to join with Shiloh. In most cases it made good sense to accept them, so I have. Shiloh lands now stretch along the mountains to the west as far as the Red River and follow that down to where it meets the Gray River. The border follows the Gray to the stream near the village of One Dog, a few miles east of Sable. Then it follows the stream up to a few miles east of Collective and cuts back to our old border just north of Collective. A few others have asked, but I’ve put them off for now, claiming I could accept those within that area as they helped us set clear border lines.”

Kyle studies the new map while slowly shaking his head. He looks up, “Nathan, that just about doubles the size of Shiloh! How are you doing with patrols for that area?”

“All of the new communities have sent young men and women to be trained for our forces. Once we have them all trained and experienced we’ll probably have a lot of them based in their home farms and towns to run patrols from them. At the moment we’ve the old patrols out for five more days so they can cover more land and I’ve added two more patrols. We’ve nearly three thousand families within our borders and more than doubled the size of the army we can field. There are more smaller communities just outside those borders that wish to join us, but I’ve left that until we can sort out this issue with Carl and his people.”

“Good work and thinking, Nathan. We can run all of the patrols more often and reduce the size of the patrols to the west and south, except for those nearest the borders. The extra depth should mean no large forces can get far without being spotted. The south-east patrols should be OK to cut in size as well. The area we have to keep frequent strong patrols is the north-east border where Carl’s people are. Spend a couple of days talking with the other community leaders to work out new patrols and patrol sizes. I’ve got a few projects to put in place, then I’ll need to know how many people I can pull out to take this war to the enemy. I want to cut into the area Carl controls and regularize the eastern border. This time I want to take a real army and have supply wagons along with cooks and camp workers. I plan to have the supply train moving in a general direction with attack forces moving out from it to hit smaller bases while still being close enough to form as a major force for a big base. This time we go to war in a proper campaign, not just a few raids.”

“I’ll see what we can work out, Lord Kyle. It would be good to move our eastern border all the way to the Gray River. That’ll bring all of the other communities asking to join within our borders.”

Kyle nods his agreement as he thinks on many things, one being the change in size and shape of Shiloh. When Jonas first established Shiloh he set up in a wide open plains area at the southern end of a series of lovely valleys with a few more valleys to each side. The farms along the base of the mountains and in the valleys for a few miles on each side asked him for protection from some brigands operating in the area. By the time Jonas had cleared out several small groups of bandits he was accepted as the liege lord of an area roughly thirty miles wide and twenty miles deep, with the corner cut off where Riverview is located. The mountain ridge marked the northern limit of the lands and still does. The borders now encompass a more rough shaped area that’s just over thirty-five miles deep and forty miles wide with a ten miles by twelve miles cut out in the north-east corner. Once the cutout area that’s under Carl’s control is dealt with Shiloh will be about two and half times bigger than when Jonas died. Kyle is glad he’s got Nathan and many other good, strong community leaders to run things in his absence. Still thinking on the sudden growth and what it means, especially in regards to available people to do the work and help with the war, he heads to the smithy to talk to the blacksmiths and the potters who work there.

While Kyle is busy with affairs of state KK, Nadia, and Larry are off checking up on how their troop training is going in their absence. All is well, so they only stop for a short while before heading off to see about other matters.

In the smithy Kyle takes the potters and blacksmiths aside to show them the plans for two kilns made from ceramic glazed bricks. He tells them how the ceramics will keep the heat in to help raise the heat to a higher temperature. Dungar, the head blacksmith, asks, “Lord Kyle, we already have more than enough heat to work the iron, so why this?”

Kyle smiles, “In his last trip my friend Larry found some sources of a metal you’re not familiar with. At the moment you heat the metal up and beat it into shape for most things. This new metal is best if we melt it and pour it into molds. We can also do that with some of the iron. The kilns will allows us to get the temperatures high enough for that to be very easy to do. Also, once we get one built we can use it to make better ceramics due to having a hotter kiln. Ceramics are best made with the hot air from the fires going over them while the metals are best with the fires in a more direct contact. We’ll use the current kiln for firing clay bricks and fire them again after we coat them with ceramics. These bricks we’ll use to make a ceramic kiln for making better ceramics. This we’ll use to make the ceramic brick kiln for the metals. In the first two the fires will be below the kiln with only the hot air going into the upper chamber. In the one for the metals we’ll have the fire and the hot air in contact with the upper chamber, but the fire will also be in contact with the bottom of the ceramic bowls the metal will be in. These kilns are shaped to keep most of the hot air in and keep it going back over the items being heated. By putting ceramic coated doors on we can get the temperature higher still by building up pressure inside. I want you to both study the plans and think on where and how big you’d like to build these. If they’re close together with the fire entrances opposite each other you can have one person keeping both fires going. The real beauty of kilns like this is the entrance for the work area can be on any side, thus two people can work on it at once; one to work the fire on his side and the other to work with the materials on another.” The several workers nod during his talk and walk off with copies of the kiln plans to study and think about later when they set about building the kilns to these plans. While some are happy with the current ways, some want to try the new ways Kyle just spoke of.

A little later Kyle talks to their best carver and asks her to carve a few items out of hardwood for him. The woman agrees while she wonders what he intends to do with a wooden knife whose blade edge will be so thin it’ll only be a shaving wide. She shrugs and she goes to select wood for the work, what Kyle wants it for is his worry, not hers, despite her knowing it’ll snap as soon as it’s used.

Kyle spends the rest of the day inspecting the compound defenses while he tries to drag up more ways to make life difficult for attackers. He takes Nadia, KK, and Larry with him when he does this. They all discuss what’s been done and suggest other options while also knocking holes in the suggestions of the others. In the end there’s not a thing they can come up with to improve the static defenses of Shiloh. They do note the berry bushes are growing well.

Nadia asks, “Kyle, I understand the thorn bushes, but why berries? Won’t they just supply a besieging enemy with food?”

Kyle grins and replies, “The great majority of the time the bushes will be used as a peaceful food source for those living here. They’ll also be a source of food and scratching to the animals. During a war they’ll be a good defense barrier and if the enemy gets to the point of eating a lot of the berries while we’re under siege the enemy troops will be spending a hell of a lot of time off in the woods from eating too many of them. Traditionally troops in a siege are underfed so they really want to get at the food in the town. Now, if the siege leaders underfeed their troops they’ll just pick and eat berries then end up with the trots. If the leaders realize this and feed them properly they’ll run out of supplies quicker. If they force the troops to cut and remove the bushes many of them will get injured and almost all will get hurt so they won’t be worth much in a fight when we sally forth in an attack as they work. No matter how you slice it, the enemy will have a major problem with the berry bushes.” The others all laugh at the pictures his words give them.

The next day Larry takes a patrol out to continue his review of the geology around Shiloh. He goes to where he finished on his last patrol and continues from there, knowing he’ll soon come across the kaolin for the best ceramics. After ’finding’ the clay Mac organized he’s checking everything as he moves toward the iron ore when he finds a deposit of very high silica sands ideal for making glass and improved ceramics. The next day he finds some high carbon sands and the iron ore two days later. After ten days in the mountains he turns the patrol for home, as he has so many good finds to report. The men don’t understand what he’s happy about because they don’t recognize what they’re looking at, but they realize he has something important from the way he reacts.

On the same day Larry leaves Kyle is busy showing the carpenters plans for a trebuchet. The real beauty about this is it uses wood, rope, leather, and rocks. It’s well within the technical capabilities of Chaos. They build one as large as they can with the timbers they have on hand and test it for range. At the point of release the sling is five feet above the walls of the Shiloh fortification, although the arm isn’t. They set to work to build smaller ones as Kyle wants two on wheels that can fire up to three quarters of a mile with deadly power and accuracy. He wants a payload of fifty or sixty pounds. He knows they can go much higher, but such machines weigh many tons and he doesn’t want one that big.

Larry arrives back to tell of his finds while they’re still testing a few of the different sized trebuchets for range and accuracy. After telling all of the leaders and the relevant specialists about his finds he has to take teams out to set up farms near them to see to their safety and collection. He also takes a team to where he found the nickel deposits last trip. Miners will start digging out both ores as metals are always good to have while farmers will build and run nearby farms to support the miners.

Years earlier Jonas introduced a variant of the Conestoga wagon for use at Shiloh. The local wagons ran to about ten or twelve feet long and three to three and a half feet wide with wheels made of solid wood, often sets of planks butted together and laid over each other with their grains in different directions. Jonas showed the Shiloh men how to make strong wheels with spokes and iron rims heated up then allowed to shrink into place. The wheel hubs and the shafts they ride are made from hardwood, not the usual softwoods. He also added a way to oil the wheels while in use via a reservoir of oil and grooves in the shaft to distribute it. All this gives a longer life to the wheel and it allows for a bigger wagon due to the lighter weight of the wheels. A better harness design allows for more horses to pull it and the size can go higher still.

Jonas’ design is twenty feet long, four feet wide, and sits higher off the ground than the local wagons. It has higher sides, wooden hoops to guide the canvas cover, with slits in the high foot area of the driver’s seat so they can look out and control the wagon while hiding below the sides. These are loaded with the side canvasses up, which are then pulled down and tied, to protect the load. The wagons are for taking goods to town or to other markets.

Kyle introduces a variant with drawers in the sides and back to place things frequently needed during the trip, work tables are secured in front of the drawers and they help hold them shut. His special design is based on plans of ’chuck-wagons’ he’s seen, but along larger lines to serve larger groups of men in the field. A similar variant is for a field hospital with the medicines and few medical tools handy in drawers and heavy duty tables to work on, it also has padded beds inside it.

While they’re being constructed he trains the wagon drivers going with them in how to form a circle of wagons for the night. Like the people crossing the plains in the American West they’re taught to circle the wagons to create a corral to keep the stock from wandering off once they’re released into the middle. Just like those settlers the circled wagons also provides a protective wooden barrier against any opponent who attacks at night. Most people using wagons on Chaos have only one to four, so they don’t have enough to warrant this maneuver and they manage by using rope corrals between wagons stopped parallel to each other. However, Kyle intends to take fifteen of the wagons with him, so this is worth teaching them to use when they have enough to do it.

Despite his best efforts to find out, when he has the time to search, Kyle can’t find out what Kathleen and Nadia are doing because they seem to be off doing something all day long as well.

About a month after they arrive at Shiloh the El Paso four are at lunch with Nathan, as is usual. When they finish Nathan leans back and says, “Lord Kyle, the Shiloh Leadership Group is sure we can give you thirty platoons plus their officers, with around fifty to handle supplies and your two contraptions.”

Kyle thinks on this. Thirty platoons is seven hundred and fifty men plus one officer per platoon and another officer per the four platoons to make a company. A company is one hundred men and five officers. The thirty platoons gives him seven and a half companies with thirty-seven officers. He slowly nods and replies, “I want Dana as a second general and two trainee generals as well. That gives us seven hundred and ninety troops and we’ll take sixty cooks, herdsmen, and camp workers for a total of eight hundred and fifty from Shiloh, plus us four as the overall leaders. This will mean we’ll have enough to deal with just about anything they can throw at us in the field by either a straight out fight or a running fight if there’s too many of them. It’ll also allow us to train more people in the senior leadership positions for other campaigns.”

Nathan thinks for a moment and nods yes while he says, “Yes, that’ll also let you to train a few more in how to use the trebuchets. I know you want fifteen wagons, but what will you put in so many?”

“Most of them will carry food and water for the men and animals while three will carry extra lances, bows, arrows, swords, and knives.”

Nathan nods, “Yes, you can make sure you’re well supplied with a few wagons of extra arms. Plus the two trebuchets and the wagon you have of rocks for the trebuchets leaves ten wagons for food and water. Yes, you can stay in the field for some weeks.”

“Nathan, I expect we may be out for some months, that’s why I’m taking herdsmen and some cattle, with plans to pick up more cattle at the farms we pass. When we get supplies I’ll give them notes for your records so you can show them as part of the farm levy or pay them.”

They spend most of the afternoon talking about the logistics of such a large force in the field. The closest Nathan has seen to something like this, in the past, was when he was very young and in a group of three hundred members of the Rider Clan who rode out to deal with a large group of bandits on the edge of their lands. However, in the Rider Clan each carries all they need to operate in the field for the operation. Kyle is taking more supplies to resupply his people in the field and reduce what they have to carry in combat. Nathan decides to think about what this approach means to field operations and to talk to his father about it on his next visit, as he can see many advantages and few disadvantages to this method.

It takes a few days to assemble the entire force at Shiloh and a week to train them in a few new maneuvers and command whistles. It should have taken longer, but the core of the troops going just finished training at Shiloh and stayed there while the rest joined them.

Seven weeks after arriving Kyle leads his force out the gates. They ride three abreast, Dana in the middle with Kyle and KK on each side of him. First Platoon of A Company, First Shiloh Regiment follows them at five abreast with their officer leading them. The three companies of the First Regiment are followed by the wagons with the three companies of the Second Regiment next and the six platoons of the Third after the stock. Kyle wants a regiment to eventually consist of ten companies, but he plans to have the force operate in two or three units for some battles and this split up will make that easier to manage. They’re good archers and cavalry people, so they can all operate in both roles.