Archery: Longbows and Crossbows
Archery: Longbows and Crossbows is an article published in The Field on 2 january 1892.
Arthur Conan Doyle argues in this letter that the effective range of longbows has been underestimated, citing historical and more recent examples of shots far beyond 300 yards, and he adds that powerful crossbows may have exceeded longbows in range even if they were slower to use.
- Read "Toxophilite" letter mentioned by Arthur Conan Doyle.
Archery: Longbows and Crossbows
Sir, — My attention has been called to a note in a recent issue of the Field in which your correspondent "Toxophilite" makes some remarks as to the range of the bow, with reference to my romance, "The White Company," and an editorial note has been appended upon the same subject. In this note, 261 and 307 yards are mentioned as being long shots. I venture to think that this is quite an underestimate.
On looking over my notes upon the subject, drawn both from modern and mediaeval sources, I find that enormously greater distances are recorded. The Turkish horn and steel bow seems to have the furthest range. Stuart in his "Antiquities of Athens," mentions that Hassan Aga, Waiwoode of Athens, could cover 584 ½ yards. Mahmoud Effendi, Secretary to the Turkish Embassy in London, shot an arrow in 1795, before the Toxophilite Club, 482 yards. While in 1798, the Sultan himself is recorded to have shot one in the presence of Sir Robert Ainslie 972 yards 2 ¾ inches.
In mediaeval England, 300 yards was not an uncommon shot, but 360 was looked upon as a good one. Barrington reports that an archer, holding his bow with his feet — as was done by Hurdle John in the text — could cover a mile in three flights. Three hundred and sixty yards was done comparatively recently by Mr James Rawson, of Cheetham Hill, Manchester, with a bow of 63lb. power. Carew says that the Cornish archers used to shoot twenty-four score paces-that is, 480 yards. The more powerful crossbows could certainly shoot further than the longbow, for that was the only advantage they could claim, since the longbow was much the quicker weapon. An archer with the longbow has been known within a minute to put twelve arrows into a 2ft. disc at 50 yards, which would be good work with a repeating rifle.
A. CONAN DOYLE.
12, Tennison-road, South Norwood.
[ Mr Conan Doyle correctly quotes the record of Mahmond Effendi having shot an arrow 482 yards with a longbow about the year 1795, in the presence of three Royal Toxophilites. The bow and arrow he used were both Persian, and they are still in the possession of the Royal Toxophilite Society, to whom he presented them. The society unfortunately was not represented on the occasion of the Sultan shooting "972 yards 2 ¾ in." in 1798, and we must regard that incident as belonging to the category which includes the splitting of willow-wands by Robin Hood at impossible distances. We cannot follow Mr Doyle into ancient history. When penning the note in which he considers that we under-estimated the power of the long bow, we were thinking of modern English archery, and we are satisfied that 300 yards is an exceptionally long distance for a longbow to carry. We had not heard of Mr Rawson's 360 yards shot; but we have found the record of Mr Troward, a member of the R.T.S., having shot 340 yards on Molesey Hurst in 1798 with a self-bow of 63lb., and an arrow 29in. in length and 48. in weight. Horace Ford, the crack shot of the nineteenth century, never accomplished more than 289 yards, and he wrote in 1856:
- Some years back, Mr Muir, of Edinburgh, made many experiments with strong and medium power bows, with the view of testing the possibility of accomplishing 300 yards; but, though an archer of great power and experience, he found that with a bow of from 591b. to 621b. he could shoot further than with a stronger one, and that that weight of bow would not quite reach the desired distance. He, however, afterwards, with a Turkish horn bow and flight arrow, accomplished a measured range of 306 yards; and this is the only authentic instance I have been able to obtain of the 300 yards having been reached or passed in modern days.
Mr Ford was himself a tall and powerful man, and we are inclined to think that if he, with all his knowledge and experience of what a bow could compass, could not shoot an arrow 300 yards, Mr Doyle would have some difficulty in finding anybody else who could perform the feat. Nor do we agree with Mr Doyle that a crossbow, such as one man could use, would carry further than a longbow. If that were so, it is strange that in the battles of the fourteenth century the English archers should not have been discomfited by the crossbow shafts of the enemy before they could reply with their longbows. We should be glad if Mr Doyle would (1) furnish us with some evidence, traditional or otherwise, of what a crossbow was capable of in the hands of a qualified man; and (2) state if he has any valid ground for supposing that an archer with a crossbow could shoot further than one with a longbow. — ED.]
Crossbow Shooting
Surgeon-Major Doyle [1] (although evidently thoroughly master of the practise vocabulary, &c., of English archery in the Middle Ages) must surely have over-estimated the powers of the crossbow of that period when he describes its range (in the third volume of that most vivid and absorbing story, the "White Company") as upwards of 500 yards ? — TOXOPHILITE.
[Hansard's "Book of Archery" quotes a celebrated modern French sportsman's authority for a crossbow throwing an arrow 400 paces; and in the "Dunstable Chronicle" (preserved in the Harleian collection of MSS., No. 21) it is stated that Henry V. came to the city of Rouen by forty rods' length within shot of quarril (a rod = 5 yards). In 1889 Mr L. W. Maxson, the American champion, shot a flight arrow 264 yards with a longbow; and Mr C. Garnett, a well-known English archer, claims to have shot an arrow 307 yards, also with a longbow. The small crossbows, handled by one person, are said to have had less range than the longbow; but some of the crossbows were formidable instruments, in which the bow was bent by means of a windlass, worked by several men. — ED.]
- ↑ Toxophilite, here, got the title wrong. In 1891, Dr. Conan Doyle was not "Surgeon-Major".
