Battery
In military organizations, an artillery battery is a unit or multiple systems of artillery, mortar systems, rocket artillery, multiple rocket launchers, surface-to-surface missiles, ballistic missiles, cruise missiles, so grouped to facilitate better battlefield communication and command and control, as well as to provide dispersion for its constituent gunnery crews and their systems.
Artillery - crew-served big guns, howitzers, or mortars with a caliber greater than small arms or infantry weapons. Rocket launchers are also commonly categorized as artillery since rockets perform much the same function as artillery projectiles, but the term artillery is more appropriately limited to large gun-type weapons using an exploding propellant charge to shoot a projectile along an unpowered trajectory [Bethell, p. 263].
Historically the term "battery" referred to a cluster of cannons in action as a group, either in a temporary field position during a battle or at the siege of a fortress or a city. Such batteries could be a mixture of cannon, howitzer, or mortar types. A siege could involve many batteries at different sites around the besieged place. The term was also used for a group of cannons in a fixed fortification for coastal or frontier defense. [Hogg]
During the 18th century, "battery" began to be used as an organizational term for a permanent unit of artillery in peace and war, although horse artillery sometimes used "troop" and fixed position artillery "company." They were usually organized with six and 12 ordnance pieces, often including cannons and howitzers. By the late 19th century, "battery" had become standard, mostly replacing companies or troops.
In the 20th century, the term was generally used for the company-level sub-unit of an artillery branch, including field, air defense, anti-tank, and position (coastal and frontier defenses). Artillery-operated target acquisition emerged during the First World War and was also grouped into batteries and has subsequently expanded to include the complete intelligence, surveillance, target acquisition, and reconnaissance (ISTAR) spectrum. 20th-century firing batteries have been equipped with mortars, guns, howitzers, rockets, and missiles [Bethell, 263].
Hogg, I., V. (2020). Artillery. Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved from: https://www.britannica.com/technology/artillery
Bethell, H., A. (1911). Modern Artillery in the Field: A Description of the Artillery of the Field Army, and the Principles and Methods of Its Employment, 263. New York:Franklin Classics.