genegwf Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 I am reading "The Germans At Beaumont Hamel" an excellent book by Jack Sheldon. On page 44 there are instructions for "Mortars and Earth Mortars". What is an Earth Mortar? Thanks for the help, Gene Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
centurion Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 Possibly a fougasse - a hole dug at an angle and filled with explosive and rubble (or scrap). Fired with a fuse or a command wire. The British Home Guard were making them in 1940. Some of the early IEDs were basically fougasses Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
willy Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 The German 25-cm minenwerfer could be used against deep dugouts, when using the larger HE round as opposed to the short and medium rounds. Perhaps Jack can comment on this as he is a member here. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Sheldon Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 Gene Glad you are enjoying the book. If you take a look at p 121, you will see a photo of one. Essentially they were large trench mortars which threw a heavy bomb a short distance. They were called Earth Mortars or Albrecht Mortars to differentiate them from the other type of heavy 'Mortar' which, in the German army, was actually a heavy howitzer, manned by the artillery. If you have the companion book The Germans at Thiepval, you will see a photo of a real monster of an earth mortar on p 56. Jack Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
willy Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 Gene Glad you are enjoying the book. If you take a look at p 121, you will see a photo of one. Essentially they were large trench mortars which threw a heavy bomb a short distance. They were called Earth Mortars or Albrecht Mortars to differentiate them from the other type of heavy 'Mortar' which, in the German army, was actually a heavy howitzer, manned by the artillery. If you have the companion book The Germans at Thiepval, you will see a photo of a real monster of an earth mortar on p 56. Jack Thankyou Jack thats cleared that one up! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
centurion Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 Gene Glad you are enjoying the book. If you take a look at p 121, you will see a photo of one. Essentially they were large trench mortars which threw a heavy bomb a short distance. They were called Earth Mortars or Albrecht Mortars to differentiate them from the other type of heavy 'Mortar' which, in the German army, was actually a heavy howitzer, manned by the artillery. If you have the companion book The Germans at Thiepval, you will see a photo of a real monster of an earth mortar on p 56. Jack The Albrecht was a form of minnewerfer made from wood wire wrapped There was another Albrecht - the Schwere Albrecht-Flugelminenwerfer which has a more sophisticated base plate - see page 76 of German Artillery of WW1 by Herbert Jaeger for a photo. Albrecht is merely the manufacturers name and Albrecht built a number of minenwerfer designs. The Albrechts were smooth bore and fired fin stabilised shells - they were classed as Provisional (makeshift) minenwerfer. All trench mortars (with the exception of the spigot granetwerfers). were called minenwerfers with the addition of Leichte, Mittler and Schwere. I have never seen the designation earth. Morser was the designation for a howitzer and there was never any confusion. In the early 1930s the term minenwerfer was change to granetwerfer and all mortars in various versions of the German army since have been so designated. I can't see where you got Earth from. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Sheldon Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 The generic term for the engineer - served weapons you have described when dug in and deployed in front line defensive positions was, as I have stated, Erdmoerser. I mentioned Albrecht mortars on the same breath, as it were, because the heavy designs were frequently the weapons of choice for this role and were deployed quite densely around Thiepval, for example. I suspect that the reason you, 'can't see where I got Earth from', is that you are insufficiently familiar with German engineering sources, though you may have come across the abbreviation 'E.M.' as the abbreviation for Erdmoerser (which were usually sited in pairs) on German trench maps. I shall shortly attempt to attach an engineering diagram of a typical two weapon dug in position. I am afraid it is not the clearest of scans, but it was the first one I came across when I looked though my documents. At present I am having difficulty uploading it, but will try later. Jack Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jack Sheldon Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 Herewith the promised sketch. Jack Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
centurion Posted 4 December , 2010 Share Posted 4 December , 2010 Sorry but your photo merely shows the position of buried wooden minenwerfers See the 1918 US Army manual on trench artillery I enclose an extract from F. Erdmorser The Erdmorser or "buried mortar" is made of a wooden cylinder reinforced with wire. The inside diameter is 25 cm. The mortar is buried in the"parados"and the bottom of the trench and the projectile slides along a wooden racer 2 m. 40 (7 feet 10 inches) in length, semi-circular in cross section and resting on the parapet with an inclination of 45°. Projectile. I—The1 The French call the projectile the "coal bucket" type. It is a cylinder made of sheet iron 3 mm. 5(1.37 inch), 25 cm. (9.82 inch) in diameter and 38 cm. (14.96 inch)inheight. The cylinder is closed at both ends by wooden blocks, one having a handle for transporting the projectile and the other being pierced with a hole in which to place the Bickford fuse. This fuse is lighted by the flash of the charge. The projectile weighs 23.5 kgs. (51.7 lbs.) and contains 12 kgs. (26.4 lbs.) of explosive containing 1kg. (2.2 lbs.) of iron bits. A smaller model is also used. This projectile has simply been improved, the bottom being reinforced with an iron sheet G. "Albrecht" Mortar This mortar is a wooden tube 2 meters (6ft.8in.)in length and 25 cm. (9.84 in.)in diameter, reinforced with wire. The bottom of the barrel rests on a wooden block. A metallic stand supports the barrel and a handwheel screw elevates and depresses the barrel. This mortar uses the same projectile as the Erdmorser at ranges varying from 35 to 600 meters. They were not Albrecht although using the same projectile. Earth merely means that they were buried. The Germans had much heavier 'conventional' minenwerfers of up to 38cm. so the term was not used to distinguish them as heavy mortars. The US document compares them to the Liven projector as having no way to point them after they have been buried unlike all other German minenwerfers. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cnock Posted 6 December , 2010 Share Posted 6 December , 2010 Erdmörser Cnock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
calibre792x57.y Posted 6 December , 2010 Share Posted 6 December , 2010 Now that is interesting because about 1980 in my wanderings across the Somme I found a sheet steel cylinder with heavy cannelure at both ends, with the remains of a wooden bung in one. It was about 15 inches long by about 10 inches in diameter. Inside was several smaller cylinders about 6-7 inches by 1.5 inches with external fragmentation grooves. Nothing remained except the metal and some of the 'bung'. This sounds like a projectile for the described mortars. It was near La Boiselle. SW Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cnock Posted 10 December , 2010 Share Posted 10 December , 2010 projectiles Erdmörser Cnock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cnock Posted 10 December , 2010 Share Posted 10 December , 2010 Erdmörser regards, Cnock Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Create an account or sign in to comment
You need to be a member in order to leave a comment
Create an account
Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!
Register a new accountSign in
Already have an account? Sign in here.
Sign In Now