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Remembered Today:

Artillery Training Map (Oxford)


Khaki

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I would be very interested to get an opinion on this GW map, I have a number of maps, trench F&F etc, but this is the only Artillery training map that I have ever had or seen.

I am curious are they rare or unusual ?, it is a paper map so I presume they didn't survive too well.

I am sure that the citizens of Oxford would have slept well knowing that the R.A had them in their thoughts & sights.? measures 27x33.5 inches. and dated 1917

khaki

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Am I missing something? Should there be an image or a link?

Ian

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Sorry Ian,

there was an image/images but the wrong one got posted and the originals had already been deleted, and the map had been returned to storage. Essentially it was a 1/20000 map of the greater Oxford area dated January? 1917, made of paper and gridded off in the normal artillery manner. At the top it reads Artillery Training Map.

I will try again when I haven't got the flu or whatever it is.

I was just curious about how unusual such a surviving map is?

thanks

khaki

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There are about 220 such maps at the IWM. They are mostly 1:20,000 of the UK and are overprinted with the same (Bonne) grid as used on normal trench maps.

The maps are marked Artillery Training and have a title of the biggest town shown. Most have no military detail at all, a tiny handful have practice trenches marked.

Howard

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Presumably gridded, the British Army went to war in 1914 with ungridded maps, this was quickly found to have major drawbacks, particularly for artillery who quickly learned that direct fire was not a good idea, switched rapidly to indirect and hence required a means of referring to locations accurately - 'just south of village xxxxx' wasn't anywhere near good enough. Of course it also brought a whole new dimension to map reading skills, and hence the need for training in these skills, thus gridded maps covering the country.

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Very good points Nigel, I have never examined the map closely, but I must see if there are any practice trench lines as mentioned by Howard.

thanks

khaki

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Thanks Howard, interesting to know, I wonder if they have an Oxford one?

khaki

Saying the British Army went to war in 1914 with ungridded maps is putting it very charitably. More accurate would be to say they went to war with some appalling maps or quite often, no maps at all. The Germans did the same. There were some French maps, the Plans Directeur that were of a quality that is recognisable today as very good, but they were locked away and no-one thought of getting them out. They were of Lambert projection, better for artillery than the Bonne projection maps we had to use that were based on the Belgian maps. The Belgian system was extended over France in time of emergency, hence the odd sheet numbering. Had the war gone on, we would have moved to the Lambert projection.

The early 1915 Bonne maps have a grid displaced very roughly 150 yards or so from later maps and the underling topography was inaccurate, hence the need to train everyone how it all works, better done in places where nasty people were not shooting at you.

The effort to get the cartography straight and of a good enough quality for "shooting off the map" and up to date is one of those stories of real unsung heroes. Their achievement in the time and circumstances was stunning.

Anyway, here is the full list, 227 maps.

Aberlady, Aldershot, Amport, Ardingly, Athlone, Aylesbury, Ballincollig, Barkston Heath, Basingstoke, Bath , Beaulieu, Bedford, Bedford No. 2, Berkhampstead, Beverley, Billericay, Bishops Stortford, Blyth, Bordon, Bovington Camp, Braintree, Bramham Moor, Brighton, Broughton, Broughty Ferry, Bury St Edmunds, Caher, Calshot, Cambridge, Cannock Chase, Canterbury, Castle Bromwich, Chelmsford, Chiddingfold, Chitterne, Chitterne , Chitterne (North), Chitterne (South), Christchurch, Clipstone, Clipstone North, Clipstone South, Colchester, Coton, Cowes, Craigton, Crowborough, Croydon, Deal, Deepcut, Doncaster, Dorking, Dover, Downham Market, Dublin North, Dublin South, Dundalk, Dunfermline, Durrington, East Grinstead, Eden Mouth, Edinburgh, Ell Barrow, Elstree, Exeter, Falmer, Feltwell, Fermoy, Filton, Fovant, Framlingham, Freshwater, Gerrard's Cross, Glasgow, Glen Imaal (Glen of Imail), Glen Imal (Glen of Imail), Gosport, Grantham, Great Grimsby, Haddington, Hampstead Heath, Harlaxton, Harlaxton Park (Grantham), Harling Road, Harrogate, Hastings, Heytesbury, High Wycombe, Hilsea, Horsham, Hounslow, Hucknall Torkard, Hull, Inchkeith, Ipswich, Jarrow, Kettering, Kildare, Kilkenny, Kilmarnock, Kirkcaldy, Larbert, Leamington, Leeds, Leeds 2, Leigh, Leighton Buzzard, Lewes, Lilbourne, Liss, Little Walsingham, London Colney, Longparish, Luton, Lydd, Lyddcamp, Maldon, Middleham, Monkton Deverill, Montrose, Musselburgh, Narborough, Newark, Newcastle, Newmarket, Newstead Abbey, Newton Ferrers, Noak Hill, North Bradley, Northampton, Norwich, Okehampton, Oswestry, Oxford, Parkhurst, Pembrey, Ponteland, Prees Heath, Preston, Preston , Preston Candover, Redesdale, Reepham, Rendcomb, Richmond, Ripon, Ropley, Salisbury Plain, Salisbury Plain No. 2, Saxmundham, Scampton, Sedgeford, Sevenoaks, Sheffield, Shenstone, Shorncliffe, Sittingbourne, St Albans, St. Asaph, Stirling, Stonehenge, Stowlangtoft, Sutton Heath, Swanage, Ternhill, The Isle Of Sheppey, Thetford, Tidworth, Tilshead, Trawsfynydd, Trowbridge, Twyford, Tynemouth, Uxbridge, Waddington, Weedon, West Meon, West Parley, Westbury, Whitchurch, Wickham Market, Winchester, Windsor, Winlaton, Witley, Witney, Woking, Woodbury Common, Woodditton, Woolwich, Wye, Yatesbury, York, Yoxford,

Howard

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Thanks Howard,

Great research there, I wonder if those training maps, were intended to serve a secondary purpose, that is as potential battle areas in case of possible invasion ?

just a thought

khaki

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I wouldn't think so, Khaki, though any map would be useful in that situation. It would have helped had they highlighted military strongpoints, but Howard says there isn't much military detail. Many of the locations included in his very useful list relate to military training areas, including 15 in South Wiltshire. No doubt several people will be thinking why such-and-such a place is included; Longparish, for example, presumably the village near Andover, Hampshire. AFAIK, the surrounding military infrastructure (or what traces of it remain) dates to the 1940s. And why Preston Candover, between Basingstoke and Winchester?

Perhaps these two locations - and others - offered useful terrain where soldiers could be taken to for some map-reading practice in the field? I don't think that there was any live firing in either place.

Moonraker

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The appropriate map scale depends on what level you are at. 1:250000 is was probably entirely appropriate at Army HQ level, but of only very limited use at infantry company level

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like the sound of the Maldon one. Would love to see it.

Regards.

SPN

Maldon

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While some of the listed map sheets cover military training areas, including ones used for artillery firing, I suggest that most sheets are for map reading training and practice. You don't need a military training area for this. Boy scouts did (and still do?) a lot of this. You can do it anywhere, but obviously from a logistic perspective in WW1 doing it close to where soldiers were stationed was convenient.

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There was clearly a lot of training going on all over the place, not just in training areas. The good people of Hungerford would not have been best pleased if a battery opened up near to the station, especially with the news that the Workhouse Chapel was used as an aiming point. As most artillery was indirect fire, it begs the question of what the gun-sight was pointed at, certainly not the target as that was almost never visible. In this example it is a landmark, but many times at the front it was a picket in the ground quite near the battery. That means the gun points one way and the sight another, getting that right needs some doing.

The map list above is not necessarily the whole set, it is simply those in the IWM. I think they are mainly of interest to cartographers rather than military historians.

Howard

post-991-0-17072600-1445334305_thumb.jpg

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As most artillery was indirect fire, it begs the question of what the gun-sight was pointed at, certainly not the target as that was almost never visible. In this example it is a landmark, but many times at the front it was a picket in the ground quite near the battery. That means the gun points one way and the sight another, getting that right needs some doing.

The map list above is not necessarily the whole set, it is simply those in the IWM. I think they are mainly of interest to cartographers rather than military historians.

No need to beg. After the first few weeks of the war guns rarely saw and aimed directly at their target. Indirect fire was the rule. This meant the guns of a battery were oriented by the battery director and recorded an aiming point (a GAP). This could be a pair of aiming posts (with lights for night use) several yards away from the gun, a distant GAP, ie the classic church tower, and from mid war or thereabouts, a parallescope, basically a long mirror, close to the gun, ie in its gun pit if appropriate. Never a single picket close to the gun for obvious reasons.

A lot is explained on this page http://nigelef.tripod.com/fc_laying.htm of my website.

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Fair enough, I am not a gunner, but this is what I meant, better put by Peter Chasseaud in his book Artillery's Astrologers.

Howard

Technical Developments in Artillery Survey.

Battery survey in 1916 consisted of fixing the position of the pivot gun and aiming points (APs); line or switch to the target was then read off the artillery board. The other guns in the battery were then given parallel line using the director. Heavy and siege battery positions were fixed by instrumental resection from trig points, and field batteries by graphic resection with the plane-table. Batteries were also fixed by resection from points not trigonometrically fixed, by subbase and director, by traversing from trig points, or by measurement from map detail. Once the position of the pivot gun had been fixed, the line, range and angle of sight could be predicted, and finally the line laid out from the AP or, increasingly, from a bearing picket (BP), which was an auxiliary trig point connected to the main triangulation. Line and range to the target or zero point could be computed using log tables or a 20-inch slide rule. Calculation of range and bearing from trig coordinates was the exception rather than the rule in 1916; they were usually measured on the artillery board.

The artillery board was used for graphic plotting of line and range, and was quick, simple and relatively accurate. Once the position of the gun and the bearing from the zero point to the AP had been found, and the position of the target identified by square coordinates (as opposed to trig or survey co-ordinates), the data could be plotted on the artillery board to eliminate errors arising from map distortion and the fact that the gun, AP and target might be on different map sheets. Protractors were found to be inaccurate and 3-foot protractors were even used in an attempt to read accurate bearings! To overcome this problem artillery boards were fitted with printed arcs. The post-war purpose of the board was to provide a check on computation rather than merely to save time or labour, but during the war it was generally used in preference to trigonometrical calculation. Line could also be laid out astronomically, and this was useful when the view from the gun was very restricted, when it was not possible to establish a BP sufficiently near the battery, or when guns were brought into position at night without preparations for giving line. This technique was little used until 1918. The compass could also be used for giving line, after reading the bearing off the artillery board and correcting for magnetic deviation, but this was a very crude method.

The practice of using BPs developed in this period, Keeling having used the method early in 1916, when with 4th FSC, for giving line to the heavy railway guns at Dernancourt. The battery director could be set up over the picket socket if this was close to the battery position; if not a traverse could be run to the dial sight of the pivot gun. If the guns of a battery were widely dispersed, each would be the subject of a separate survey. That the use of BPs was not standard practice in 1916 is indicated by the absence of any mention of them in the Maps and Artillery Boards pamphlet. Salmon and Winterbotham recorded their widespread installation by 3rd FSC (though not necessarily their use by the gunners!) on Third Army front in the latter part of 1916 Similarly, Matthews of 1st FSC recorded that it became practice to provide BPs in First Army area towards the end of 1916. 3rd FSC published a sheet of instructions, Heavy Artillery Boards, at the end of 1916 or early in 1917, and this specifically noted the use of BPs, at that time known as 'survey pickets,' in cases either when the gun had not been in position when the board was prepared or when the battery commander had been using a temporary aiming point that had not been surveyed:

Where this is done it is usual to give particulars on the board of the bearings from the nearest survey picket so that the battery commander can get his own line accurately with a director - the survey picket is also marked on the board in order to show where it is but not to protract bearings from, as it is usually much too close for accurate results.

Armies later published lists of such survey pickets for the artillery. First Army published a List of Pegs on Army Front, giving bearings from each picket to two APs, in July 1918. MacLeod, of 4th FSC/B, stated that in Fourth Army their use by the artillery was not widespread until after the Cambrai battle of November 1917, and that much training in their use was necessary in 1918. In general it may be said that intensive indoctrination in the use of BPs of officers of field batteries in particular (siege and heavy batteries used them much earlier) was carried out from May or June 1918, FSCs running courses specifically for this purpose. 3rd FSB printed a pamphlet Notes on Survey Methods of Setting Out Line for Batteries in June 1918, while 4th FSB produced an abbreviated version of this and a map in the summer of 1918 showing 'director stations' in the Lys area.

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RE survey 'fixed' 'bearing pickets', the BP card included the coordinates of the BP and grid bearings to distant objects. This enabled a director to be set up over the BP and oriented accurately to the map. The director was then used to orient the guns in their zero line. That said sometimes the director was elsewhere on the gun position so had to be oriented by another director over the BP, the BP also provided the point from which some simple survey was done by the battery to provide the accurate location of the pivot gun (used for the calculations of firing data). If no BP was available then the director was oriented by compass and the pivot gun 'fixed' by map-spot or compass resection.

Distant GAPs were useful in daylight, but a tad difficult to use at night. That is why a pair of aiming posts or a parallelscope both positioned close to each gun were used. The former had a light fixed to each at night, the latter reflected the image of the dial sight (illuminated at night).

I'd also note that although firing data was sometimes fully calculated, more usually map range and a switch from the zero line was measured on a map (or arty board from about mid-war), and then could be adjusted for meteor conditions (and actual muzzle velocity if the gun did not have calibrating sights).

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Maps and grids are not often discussed. Hence it may not be out of order to extend this thread. My understanding ( as a keen map user- mostly OS - but by no means a cartographer) of the early French and Belgium maps is limited to an appreciation that the French, outside fortified areas, were poor and that Belgian were much better; but the base lines of the Belgian surveys did not suit being extended southwards as the BEFs front extended. As far as grids are concerned I have never understood why the BEF adopted rectangles as opposed to squares and the, I suppose, related use of a mixture of letters and figures to provide references. Did the artillery maps use a more OS type grid?

Old Tom

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Maps and grids are not often discussed. Hence it may not be out of order to extend this thread. My understanding ( as a keen map user- mostly OS - but by no means a cartographer) of the early French and Belgium maps is limited to an appreciation that the French, outside fortified areas, were poor and that Belgian were much better; but the base lines of the Belgian surveys did not suit being extended southwards as the BEFs front extended. As far as grids are concerned I have never understood why the BEF adopted rectangles as opposed to squares and the, I suppose, related use of a mixture of letters and figures to provide references. Did the artillery maps use a more OS type grid?

Old Tom

The maps of France available to the British army in 1914 were mainly like this one, published at 1:80,000 and based on a 1:40,000 survey in the 1880s and 1890s. Owing to the re-scaling and other factors, they were not very accurate, certainly not good enough to shoot off the map. The levelling data is best described as approximate, more accurately described as (put a very rude word here).

The Belgian maps were much better so their map grid was extended into France as an emergency measure, hence the odd sheet numbering in France. This was done by laying them out on a large flat floor all together and using very long rulers, there was no time to do anything else. They are on the Bonne projection so not well suited to artillery as that projection does not preserve bearing, but in the range of the guns and the use of pre-registration for a shoot, they could live with it. As the trench lines settled down, the British embarked on a huge re-survey, but for continuity they kept to the Bonne projection. Later in the war, use of the better Lambert projection was planned but only one or two 1917/1918 British Lambert maps exist. In 1914 no-one foresaw the reality of the trench lines so preparations were not made, the 1:100,000 topographical maps that were available were of good quality and suited to the expected war of movement. (This happened again prior to the Falklands War in 1982, as the task force was about to set sail, an officer was despatched to a famous London map shop to buy all they had.)

Early 1915 maps of the Loos area were scaled off the 1:80,000 maps like the one here so were quite poor, the ones in 1916 are far more accurate as a result of the re-survey. This causes trouble, a single map ref. near Loos gives two different places depending on the age of the map.

The Germans also used the French 1:80,000 maps, there are many examples of them with a German over print, but they do not seem to have adopted the same rigour in mapping as the British- we were used to the amazing Ordnance Survey, an organisation that produced some astounding results in the Great War period. The maps of 1917 and 1918 are superb, especially when you consider the limited time available for the fundamental geodetic work and detailed cartography. It took 70 years to complete the first survey of England.

The maps of the time had a common letter and numbered grid reference system. The cartographers thought (wrongly) that the artillery could not cope with metres, assuming all their tables were in yards, so the maps from the metre based Belgian grid had a yard based grid overprinted, hence the misfit at the edges. Had they spoken to the gunners, much grief could have been avoided. Other problems were coped with, the French and Belgian primary survey had significant errors, so converting position data had to be done by hand in conjunction with correction tables. (Wouldn't they have loved a computer or two!)

The key to the cartographic troubles was the time available. The British had top-drawer surveyors, cartographers and gunners but fought in a place and manner not foreseen. Had that been foreseen, the British army would have gone to war with a good supply of accurate maps. In the circumstances they did a truly outstanding job.

Howard

post-991-0-33252200-1445792835_thumb.jpg

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Saying the British Army went to war in 1914 with ungridded maps is putting it very charitably. More accurate would be to say they went to war with some appalling maps or quite often, no maps at all.

They do seem to have had a lot of (rather inadequate, but probably the best available) Belgian maps - several accounts, both British and German, mention this. Of course, after Mons a fat lot of good these did them! But it does suggest that the pre war General Staff had got some sort of act together - indeed the Germans cited the scale of mapping on the British side as clear evidence that Britain always intended to come into the war.

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They do seem to have had a lot of (rather inadequate, but probably the best available) Belgian maps - several accounts, both British and German, mention this. Of course, after Mons a fat lot of good these did them! But it does suggest that the pre war General Staff had got some sort of act together - indeed the Germans cited the scale of mapping on the British side as clear evidence that Britain always intended to come into the war.

That may refer to the good quality GSGS 2364 maps drawn at 1:100,000 as here. They have a familiar feel even now but are only suitable for a war of movement, the very kind of war the Germans set out in their Schlieffen Plan.

It is one of those puzzles that Germany did not have better maps. They had all the knowledge required but it seems the drive for good maps is nowhere quite as strong as it was then and still is in Britain. In the 2nd World War, the Germans used OS maps for many of their invasion plans, it is reputed that one even still bears the OS Copyright text!

We used the French 1:80,000 maps even after having made the GSGS 2364 series. A set of these 1:80,000 maps drawn in the 1800s was published in the 1940s (GSGS 4326) with a geological overprint covering most of the Great War front. The interesting thing here to note is that much of the geological data came from pre-Great War surveys, i.e. the geology of the front was well known and mapped beforehand, aiding mining operations, water supply etc.

Howard

post-991-0-04631100-1445796727_thumb.jpg

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If I correctly recall Chasseud, one of the problems at the beginning of the war was that French and Belgian maps were on different projections, none were gridded and most were 1:100,000 scale or smaller. They could only get better from a start like that. Of course the system of map references was well short of ideal from an artillery point of view, a mix of letters and numbers made it a tad difficult to use trig calculations. I'm not sure that in practice RE surveyors surveyed the pivot gun before the battery arrived, detailed selection of the gun position in an allotted area was a matter for the battery not the RE surveyors! Hence a BP in the vicinity.

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The French and Belgian both used Bonne but with differences, sufficient to be a nuisance. National pride may have been the reason but it would have been handy for both nations to have continuous mapping across the area.

Then there were the French Plans Directeur maps, produced at 1:20,000 on the Lambert projection and excellent for artillery, they covered a fair bit of the British front. For some reason no-one thought to tell the British they existed so they stayed in Paris until after the re-survey was under way. The cartographic situation early in the war was really an emergency, it takes along time to survey an area and make good maps so the best was made of a bad situation.

I suspect the old British/French antipathy was also behind some of the difficulties. The French 1:80,000 series was old even then and of low quality, this from a nation pre-eminent in cartography. In many ways they were ahead of the British and had the enviable legacy of Méchain, Delambre, the Cassini family etc. Something went wrong in the period leading up to the Great War. The Belgians knew their maps were important and escaped from the German advance with (from memory) 14 tonnes of lithographic printing stones. These were invaluable as the normal system was to have the basic topography on a stone then to overprint the maps with whatever grid was desired (or no grid). The British overprinted a yard based grid on these metric maps- a shame but in the time available, probably a reasonable solution.

Howard

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  • 2 weeks later...

Thanks all, this is a fascinating discourse. I treasure two 1801 OS maps that I was left, so appreciate the extraordinary efforts that had been taken to accurately map landscape features through the nineteenth century, but was completely unaware of the complexities of adding useful grids!

DJM

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I would be very interested to get an opinion on this GW map, I have a number of maps, trench F&F etc, but this is the only Artillery training map that I have ever had or seen.

I am curious are they rare or unusual ?, it is a paper map so I presume they didn't survive too well.

I am sure that the citizens of Oxford would have slept well knowing that the R.A had them in their thoughts & sights.? measures 27x33.5 inches. and dated 1917

khaki

found them

post-29707-0-47710100-1446643394_thumb.j post-29707-0-66121700-1446643447_thumb.j

post-29707-0-37735900-1446643487_thumb.j

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