Hythe School of Musketry

“Sir – Additional candidates being required for the corps of permanent instructors of musketry now in the course of organisation under the regulations issued from this department on the 13th of August last, I received the commands of Field-Marshal Viscount Hardinge again to call upon you to furnish the names of any men belonging to the regiment under your command who may be eligible and willing to be transferred to the corps in question.”

Situated in a remote corner of the kingdom, on the coast of Kent, about 18 miles from Dover, is this our new military establishment, of the existence of which the great majority of the public are probably not aware. It owes its origin to the introduction of the Minié rifle into the army, and has been established little more than a year and a half, or since April 1853. Guided by his experience of our military system, the Commander-in-Chief judged that, if it were left to the commanding officers of regiments to see that the men under them were properly instructed in the use of the new weapon, he should fail of securing throughout the army that uniformity of practice so essential to the efficiency of the service, and advised the creation of a special establishment which might serve at once as a training school for our infantry and marines.