What was the first battle in history fought by vast-majority-% “distance-shooting” non-mechanized force?

Question

Historically, armies usually had a balance between warriors with projectile weapons (bows/guns) and close combat edged weapons (sword/pike/axe etc...).

This was necessary because ranged weapons of the time were not good enough to prevent armored-enough (or just fast-enough) force to close in with the shooters and hack them down with swords.

In some armies the same warriors fulfilled both roles (e.g. Mongols, gun-equiped cavalrymen of 30 year war, or bayonetted riflemen), but the "swordsman/pikeman" role was just as required as with separated roles. Even Mongols, after raining down arrows on an enemy, closed in for edged weapon fight - same with 30-year-war cavalry or infantry tercios.

This is obviously not the case today, where handheld edged weapons are a last-resort backup and rarely used in full-on combat outside urban fighting, or even including it.

My question is:

What was the first battle that clearly was fought - by both sides - in the modern way, with vast majority of the fighting, by design, being done by firing projectile weapons at a distance?

---

To clarify the question in response to comments:

• "At a distance" - Simply means that the casualty was inflicted by a solid object propelled away from the soldier, and NOT held in the hand. In other words, a bullet shot from a gun counts. Clubbing over the head with the gun stock doesn't.^[0]

• "Vast majority" as measured by either:

  • Most importantly, casualty ratios from ranged weapon wounds vs. handheld weapon wounds.

    Yeah, a US Army infantryman today is trained and able to kill an enemy with a bayonet, an entrenching tool, a combat knife, or a pencil or toothpick if need be. But in a random infantry-on-infantry battle, how many enemy casualties are inflicted by toothpicks, how many by bayonets/knives, and how many by bullets?

  • Alternately, by attempted attacks (where attempted attack is a fired bullet or a single strike with edged weapon)

• "By design" - meaning that your doctrine, your training, and your expected and actual battle intends for that vast-majority fighting (as defined above) to be with ranged weapon.

  This is important to eliminate useless trivial example where a small force came in for regular ancient-style sword infantry fight, got 10 people killed at a distance from a bow, got frightened and ran away before closing in because the enemy was too numerically superior. The casualty ratio is 10/0 for range weapons, but that is by accident, not design.

• This is about personal ranged weapons (say, man-portable). Bows, rifles, muskets.

  It excludes things like artillery/airplanes/tanks.

_{[0] - Minor complication would be included in whether hand-thrown edged weapons count as range weapons (which might plausibly introduce as a possible answer some Javelin-exclusive battle I'm not aware of), as hand-held edge weapons (in which case "range weapons distance" must be increased to exceed throw distance), or simply ignored which introduces neither of those 2 complexities}

Answer 1

It was more accidental than anything else, but the first "shooting" battle treated as such by history was the battle of Crecy, in 1346, during the 100 Years' War.

This was waged mainly between 6,000-7,000 longbowmen on the English side, and 6,000 (Genovese) crossbowmen on the French side. The English had perhaps 3,000-6,000 non-bow infantry and cavalry, meaning that their soldiers had predominantly missile weapons. The French did have about 12,000 cavalry, and perhaps an equal number of non-bow infantry, but these played a relatively small part in the battle.

The English enjoyed a prepared defensive position, while the French army had marched all day, arriving at 4:00 p.m. The more sensible soldiers, including King Philip wanted to wait until the following day to attack, but the French nobles, made overconfident by a 3- to 1 numerical superiority chafed impatiently, and won the day. A summer shower wet the bowstrings of the Genovese archers in open field eliminating their effectiveness (the English were able to shelter their bows.

Nevertheless, the Genovese were forced to attack against their wishes, and were slaughtered by long bows outfiring their crossbows at a rate of 3- to -1. The French cavalry charged, completing the slaughter of the Genovese, but were repulsed by the English long bowmen. And French infantry were just sitting ducks for English archery.

In round figures, the french lost about 2,000 crossbowmen, 2,000 knights, and 2,000 infantry, nearly all to long bow fire. The English lost perhaps 600, mostly to crossbow fire, with a few being killed by French knights.

Answer 2

I would disagree with Tom Au's answer. The first examples of "modern warfare" engagements where both sides expected to prevail in battle with ranged weapons took place a few months into the US Civil War.

The key is the development of the rifle versus the musket. Prior to that, firearms didn't have an effective range sufficient to counter an infantry charge. The effective range of a rifle was just under 1,000 yards, so an advance of infrantry would need to "absorb" three or more volleys of accurate rifle fire before hitting the enemy line. The result was slaughter and stalemate.

The English did have a period where their longbow was a superior weapon that neutralized lesser-equipped archers and crossbowmen, but people fighting the English did not expect to win battles with missile weapons. In fact, the main objective of someone fighting the English was to avoid the bowmen!