Recent from talks
Trained band
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
Trained band
Trained bands were companies of part-time militia in England, Wales and the Americas. first organized in the 16th century and dissolved in the 18th. The term was used after this time to describe the London militia.
In England and Wales, organised by county, they were supposed to drill on a regular basis, although this was rarely the case in practice. The regular army was formed from the Trained Bands in the event of war, though the inability or unwillingness of many of the bands to serve outside of their home regions often left the army short on manpower compared to the paper strength implied by the Trained Bands rolls. They later became common in the American colonies, where they are normally referred to as Trainbands. Similar organisations include the Dutch Schutterij, and the Swiss militia, elements of which remain in existence today.
The exact derivation and usage is not clear. A nineteenth-century dictionary says, under "Train":
train-band, i.e. train'd band, a band of trained men, Cowper, John Gilpin, st. I, and used by Dryden and Clarendon (Todd)
— Skeat's Etymological Dictionary of the English Language (Oxford 1879)
The issue is whether the men "received training" in the modern sense, or whether they were "in the train" or retinue or were otherwise organized around a military "train" as in horse-drawn artillery.
Founded in 1572, and organised by county, it was not until the 'Exact Militia Programme' of 1625 that they began to have regular training and weapons drill. Even then, standards varied considerably, and depended on the level of financial support by the local gentry. Although Charles I tried to assemble armies of around 30,000 militia for the 1639 and 1640 Bishops' Wars, there was considerable reluctance to serve outside their counties, and a proportion were armed only with longbows. In 1588, the Trained Bands consisted of 79,798 men, categorized by their primary weapon: 36% arquebusiers, 6% musketeers, 16% bowmen, 26% pikemen, and 16% billmen.
A standard drill book was issued in February 1638, which was used throughout the 1639 to 1653 Wars of the Three Kingdoms, together with a muster roll by county. This shows large variations in size, equipment and training; the largest was Yorkshire, which had 12,000 men, then London, with 8,000, increased in 1642 to 20,000. Counties like Shropshire or Glamorgan had fewer than 500 men.
Hub AI
Trained band AI simulator
(@Trained band_simulator)
Trained band
Trained bands were companies of part-time militia in England, Wales and the Americas. first organized in the 16th century and dissolved in the 18th. The term was used after this time to describe the London militia.
In England and Wales, organised by county, they were supposed to drill on a regular basis, although this was rarely the case in practice. The regular army was formed from the Trained Bands in the event of war, though the inability or unwillingness of many of the bands to serve outside of their home regions often left the army short on manpower compared to the paper strength implied by the Trained Bands rolls. They later became common in the American colonies, where they are normally referred to as Trainbands. Similar organisations include the Dutch Schutterij, and the Swiss militia, elements of which remain in existence today.
The exact derivation and usage is not clear. A nineteenth-century dictionary says, under "Train":
train-band, i.e. train'd band, a band of trained men, Cowper, John Gilpin, st. I, and used by Dryden and Clarendon (Todd)
— Skeat's Etymological Dictionary of the English Language (Oxford 1879)
The issue is whether the men "received training" in the modern sense, or whether they were "in the train" or retinue or were otherwise organized around a military "train" as in horse-drawn artillery.
Founded in 1572, and organised by county, it was not until the 'Exact Militia Programme' of 1625 that they began to have regular training and weapons drill. Even then, standards varied considerably, and depended on the level of financial support by the local gentry. Although Charles I tried to assemble armies of around 30,000 militia for the 1639 and 1640 Bishops' Wars, there was considerable reluctance to serve outside their counties, and a proportion were armed only with longbows. In 1588, the Trained Bands consisted of 79,798 men, categorized by their primary weapon: 36% arquebusiers, 6% musketeers, 16% bowmen, 26% pikemen, and 16% billmen.
A standard drill book was issued in February 1638, which was used throughout the 1639 to 1653 Wars of the Three Kingdoms, together with a muster roll by county. This shows large variations in size, equipment and training; the largest was Yorkshire, which had 12,000 men, then London, with 8,000, increased in 1642 to 20,000. Counties like Shropshire or Glamorgan had fewer than 500 men.
Recent media