Topic: Soldiers' Load
What a Soldier Carries
The Average Pack Weighs 62.41 Pounds
Continual Efforts to Make Equipment Lighter
Boston Evening Transcript, 23 May 1908
Washington, May 23.—The problem of the soldier's field equipment is one that is continually before the military authorities. On the one hand every effort is made to lighten his pack in order that he may be able to march and to fight better; on the other hand, the improvements in material and the changes in conditions of warfare constantly demand additions to his pack; intrenching tools, range finders, cooking utensils, tools for removing obstructions (wire entanglements, etc.), and others too numerous to mention. The weight of the arms, ammunition and equipments carried by the infantry soldier of the different armies of the world is as follows:
| Germany | 60.71 pounds |
| France | 57.48 pounds |
| France (Alpine troops) | 70.61 pounds |
| Italy | 64.10 pounds |
| Italy (Alpine troops) | 63.02 pounds |
| Japan (summer) | 62.40 pounds |
| Austria-Hungary | 58.55 pounds |
| Russia | 64.25 pounds |
| Switzerland (old pack) | 66.41 pounds |
| Switzerland (experimental pack, 1907) | 56.96 pounds |
The French infantryman therefore carries the lightest pack and the French Alpine chasseur the heaviest. The average pack weighs 62.41 pounds. The United States soldier marches very light, but then he has no prescribed intrenching tools or individual cooking implements (other than his mess kit) to carry, so that it is not possible to compare his equipment directly with that of the European soldier.
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