Artillery battery
In military organizations, an artillery battery is a unit or multiple systems of artillery, mortar systems, rocket artillery, multiple rocket launchers, surface-to-surface missiles, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, grouped to facilitate better battlefield communication and command and control, as well as to provide dispersion for its constituent gunnery crews and their systems. The term is also used in a naval context to describe groups of guns on warships.
Land usage
Historically the term "battery" referred to a cluster of cannons in action as a group, either in a temporary field position during a battle or at the siege of a fortress or a city. Such batteries could be a mixture of cannon, howitzer, or mortar types. A siege could involve many batteries at different sites around the besieged place. The term also came to be used for a group of cannons in a fixed fortification, for coastal or frontier defence. During the 18th century "battery" began to be used as an organizational term for a permanent unit of artillery in peace and war, although horse artillery sometimes used "troop" and fixed position artillery "company". They were usually organised with between 6 and 12 ordnance pieces, often including cannon and howitzers. By the late 19th century "battery" had become standard mostly replacing company or troop.In the 20th century the term was generally used for the company level sub-unit of an artillery branch including field, air-defence, anti-tank and position. 20th-century firing batteries have been equipped with mortars, guns, howitzers, rockets and missiles.
Mobile batteries
During the Napoleonic Wars some armies started grouping their batteries into larger administrative and field units. Groups of batteries combined for field combat employment called Grand Batteries by Napoleon.Administratively batteries were usually grouped in battalions, regiments or squadrons and these developed into tactical organisations. These were further grouped into regiments, simply "group" or brigades, that may be wholly composed of artillery units or combined arms in composition. To further concentrate fire of individual batteries, from World War I they were grouped into "artillery divisions" in a few armies. Coastal artillery sometimes had completely different organizational terms based on shore defence sector areas.
Batteries also have sub-divisions, which vary across armies and periods but often translate into the English "platoon" or "troop" with individual ordnance systems called a "section" or "sub-section", where a section comprises two artillery pieces.
The rank of a battery commander has also varied, but is usually a lieutenant, captain, or major.
The number of guns, howitzers, mortars or launchers in an organizational battery has also varied, with the calibre of guns usually being an important consideration. In the 19th century four to 12 guns was usual as the optimum number to maneuver into the gun line. By the late 19th century, a mountain artillery battery was divided into a gun line and an ammunition line. The gun line consisted of six guns and 12 ammunition mules.
During the American Civil War, artillery batteries often consisted of six field pieces for the Union Army and four for the Confederate States Army, although this varied. Batteries were divided into sections of two guns apiece, each section normally under the command of a lieutenant. The full battery was typically commanded by a captain. Often, particularly as the war progressed, individual batteries were grouped into battalions under a major or colonel of artillery.
In the 20th century it varied between four and 12 for field artillery, or even two pieces for very heavy pieces. Other types of artillery such as anti-tank or anti-aircraft have sometimes been larger. Some batteries have been "dual-equipped" with two different types of gun or mortar, and taking whichever was more appropriate when they deployed for operations.
From the late 19th century field artillery batteries started to become more complex organisations. First they needed the capability to carry adequate ammunition, typically each gun could only carry about 40 rounds in its limber so additional wagons were added to the battery, typically about two per gun. The introduction of indirect fire in the early 20th century necessitated two other groups, firstly observers who deployed some distance forward of the gun line, secondly a small staff on the gun position to undertake the calculations to convert the orders from the observers into data that could be set on the gun sights. This in turn led to the need for signalers, which further increased as the need to concentrate the fire of dispersed batteries emerged and the introduction fire control staff at artillery headquarters above the batteries.
Fixed battery
Fixed artillery refers to guns or howitzers on mounts that were either anchored in one spot, or on carriages intended to be moved only for the purposes of aiming, and not for tactical repositioning. Historical versions often closely resembled naval cannon of their day, "garrison carriages," like naval carriages, were short, heavy, and had four small wheels meant for rolling on relatively smooth, hard surfaces. Later, both naval and garrison carriages evolved traversing platforms and pivoting mounts. Such mounts were typically used in forts, or permanent defensive batteries, such as coastal artillery. Fixed batteries could be equipped with much larger guns than field artillery units could transport, and the gun emplacement was only one part of an extensive installation that included magazines and systems to deliver ammunition from the magazines to the guns. Improvements in mobile artillery, naval and ground; air attack; and precision guided weapons have limited fixed position's usefulness.NATO
Within NATO member nations, it is typical to label company sized organizations of artillery as "batteries." NATO defines a company as "larger than a platoon, but smaller than a battalion" while being a "unit consisting of two or more platoons, usually of the same type, with a headquarters and a limited capacity for self-support." The standard NATO symbol for a company consists of a single vertical line placed above a framed unit icon.| American | Battery |
| Belgium | Batterie |
| British | Battery |
| Bulgaria | Batareja |
| Canadian | Battery |
| Czech Republic | Baterie |
| Denmark | Batteri |
| Estonia | Patarei |
| Finland | Patteri |
| French | Batterie |
| German | Batterie |
| Hungary | Üteg |
| Italian | Batteria |
| Lithuania | Baterija |
| Netherlands | Batterij |
| Norway | Batteri |
| Polish | Bateria |
| Portuguese | Bateria |
| Romania | Bateria |
| Spain | Bateria |
| Turkey | Batarya |
Naval usage
"Battery" is a relatively modern term at sea. Advanced warships in the Age of Sail, such as the ship of the line, mounted dozens of similar cannons grouped in broadsides, sometimes spread over several decks. This remained the standard main weapon layout for centuries, until the mid-19th century evolution of the naval rifle and revolving gun turrets came to displace fixed cannon.The first operational use of a rotating turret was on the American ironclad, designed during the American Civil War by John Ericsson. Open barbettes were also used to house their main batteries on rotating mounts. Both designs allowed naval engineers to dramatically reduce the number of guns present in the battery, by giving a handful of guns the ability to concentrate on either side of the ship. In time this trend reversed, with a proliferation of weapons of multiple calibers being arranged somewhat haphazardly about a vessel, many in mounts on the hull or superstructure with limited travel. Confusion also arose when combinations of large caliber "main battery" and smaller "secondary battery" weapons of mixed offensive and defensive use were deployed.
This began to be resolved with the 1906 launching of the revolutionary "all big gun" battleship. It shipped a main battery of ten heavy caliber guns, and a smaller secondary battery for self-defense. This leap in heavy offensive armament from a standard four large caliber guns to a main battery of ten made all other battleships obsolete overnight, as the weight of broadside it could unleash, and overwhelming rate of fire a superior number of similar weapons could sustain, could overwhelm any similarly sized warship.
Image:Iowa 16 inch Gun-EN.svg|thumb|250px|right|Cut-away illustration of a triple 16"/50 caliber Mark 7 gun turret. Three of these formed the main battery of s.
A third, or tertiary battery, of weapons lighter than the secondary battery was typically mounted. To simplify the design many later ships used dual-purpose guns to combine the functions of the secondary battery and the heavier guns of the tertiary batteries. Many dual-purpose guns also served in an anti-aircraft role. In addition, dedicated light-caliber rapid-fire anti-aircraft weapons were deployed, often in the scores. An example of this combination was the, which carried a main battery of eight guns, a secondary battery of twelve guns for defense against destroyers and torpedo boats, as well as a tertiary battery of various anti-aircraft guns ranging in caliber from.
Conventional artillery as a vessel's battery has been largely displaced by guided missiles for both offensive and defensive actions. Small caliber guns are retained for niche roles, such as the multi-barrel Phalanx CIWS rotary cannon used for point defense. The rapid fire 5"/54 caliber Mark 45 gun and Otobreda 76 mm used for close defense against surface combatants and shore bombardment are among the last traditional naval guns still in use.