Casualty Figures

views updated

Casualty Figures

CASUALTY FIGURES. In land warfare of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the ratio of wounded to killed in battle was about three or four to one. Figures that vary appreciably from this ratio are to be considered suspect: they stem either from deliberate falsification or from incomplete reporting. Bennington, Stony Point, and Monmouth are examples. Among those classified as "wounded" in most battle reports of the Revolutionary War were men who subsequently died of their wounds. Those reported "missing" included prisoners, deserters, unrecovered dead, and men—wounded and otherwise—who subsequently rejoined their unit.

SEE ALSO Bennington Raid; Monmouth, New Jersey; Stony Point, New York.