First use of a "Bengalore" ?

[laurent59]

Hello,

In an account about the 40th Bn AIF near Armentières in early 1917, the veteran Reginald BIGGS relate the first use of a "torpedo bengalore" made by the 3rd Divisional Engineers and gave to the 40th Bn in rue du bois sector Bois-Grenier village near Armentières for test.

Here is the account :

" the "Bengalore Torpedo" was a tube of 25 feet long and 3 inch thick stuff with explosive and blow up by an electric impulse commanded from our lines. We musted doing a breach in the army barbed wire but both lines are so close that our artillery couldn't do it. So, on the order from Lt GREEN, Franck with the Corporal John LINNEL and other volunteers crept silently across the No Man's Land and put the "Bengalore" under the ennemies barbed wire. The "bengalore" line was 100 feet long. Switch on, the wire turn red some seconds and the "torpedo" exploded in a big bang, and 20 yards of barbed wire was blown. The Boche who understood nothing, bombed our lines"

I hope my translation is approximatly correct.

Does somebody read or heard something about this event ?

Thank you for your help.

Regards

Laurent

[truthergw]

Hi Laurent. The Bangalore torpedo was invented in 1912. Used originally to clear mines and similar debris from Boer War from a safe distance. Named from the city of Bangalore, India. Most of that from Wiki so subject to the usual health warning. They were still being used in WW2 and the opening sequence of Saving Private Ryan shows one being used by the US troops.

[squirrel]

IIRC the use, not very succesfully, of Bangalore Torpdoes is mentioned in 1916 in Frank Richards's book "Old Soldiers Never Die".

[centurion]

Hi Laurent. The Bangalore torpedo was invented in 1912. Used originally to clear mines and similar debris from Boer War from a safe distance. Named from the city of Bangalore, India. Most of that from Wiki so subject to the usual health warning. They were still being used in WW2 and the opening sequence of Saving Private Ryan shows one being used by the US troops.

Not sure about this - very few mines were used in the South African War (which was over ten years by 1912) and then only in the last stages by British forces to deny fords and he like to Boer Kommandos. No real need for a Bangalore torpedo . They were introduced in 1915 on the Western front for wire cutting. Certainly used in WW2 in Europe by British forces, often very long and pushed by a universal carrier. Superseded by the Conger* fired from a gutted carrier towed by a Churchill engineering tank.

* A hose carried by a rocket which after landing was pumped full of nitroglycerine and then exploded

A device like the Bangalore was used in the Russo Japanese war (a Yokosama torpedo? )

[Heid the Ba]

Laurent59, the translation seems clear enough.

Bangalore was the base for the Madras Sappers of the old Indian Army, and (I think) of the Indian Army engineers.

[Ron Clifton]

IIRC the use, not very succesfully, of Bangalore Torpdoes is mentioned in 1916 in Frank Richards's book "Old Soldiers Never Die".

If the wire was fairly loosely wound, I think a Bangalore torpedo would simply have lifted the wire up in the air and dropped it back uncut. This was commonly the case when HE shells were used, and shrapnel shells were less effective before the 106 fuze was introduced.

Ron

[centurion]

If the wire was fairly loosely wound, I think a Bangalore torpedo would simply have lifted the wire up in the air and dropped it back uncut. This was commonly the case when HE shells were used, and shrapnel shells were less effective before the 106 fuze was introduced.

Ron

There are accounts of it being an effective wire cutter in Salonika

[Jack Sheldon]

As far as I know Bangalore torpedoes are still in service with the British Army, nothing more effective for the purpose having been produced. I used them in training in the mid 1980s and they are extremely effective at cutting barbed wire regardless of how tight or loose it is fixed. The danger area left and right is about 1,000 metres, but forward or backwards is very short - a matter of a few metres. This makes them particularly useful for use by dismounted infantry.

Jack

[centurion]

The British army encountered difficulties with Boer barbed wire in the South African War. Devices similar to a Bangalore Torpedo were used by the Japanese to clear Russian barbed wire at the Siege of Port Arthur and against Russian positions in Manchuria. Based on the British experience and the Japanese solution the Bengal Engineers developed the Bangalore Torpedo in 1907 (not 1912) as a wire cutter. To be used effectively it is pushed through the middle of the wire (not on the ground) or even rested on top. This ensures the maximum blast cutting effect.

[Guest]

"The Bangalore Torpedo was invented by Maj R L McClintock DSO RE of the Madras Sappers and Miners. See the RE Journal March 1913" according to footnote 5 on page 479 of The Military Engineer in India Vol I by Lt Col WC Sandes. It is mentioned in the chapter on the Great War - the Bengal Sappers in France during Nov and Dec 1914 and quotes Brig Edmonds in Military Operations: France and Begiuim 1915 Vol III p.7 and footnote "The Indian Corps by virtue of its early initiation into trench warfare had taken the lead under its Chief Engineer, Brig Gen HC Nanton RE in the manufacture of trench mortars, grenades, periscopes and other trench appliances which the troops were driven to improvise. The footnote to this quote mentions Maj McClintock and his invention. The context of the footnote clearly implies the Bangalore Torpedo was being used in Nov and Dec 1914 in France by the Indian Corps.

I have not read the RE Journal article of 1913 and it is possible that the invention could pre-date 1913. The article will I am sure resolve the debate of when it was invented and is presumably the reference for the Wiki article which suggests a Captain McClintock invented it in 1912. I suspect the RE would know who invented it and when it was invented. Doubtless similar devices predate McClintock's invention and he may have been inspired by other improvised explosive devices

I can confirm that we were still teaching the manufacture of these as late as 1989 and we used them in training in the jungles of Brunei - we normally used two 6' lengths of angle iron fence posts which made excellent cuting edges but in the absence of these we improvised with split bamboo packed with PE 4 explosive. The regiment I was privileged to serve in being the Queens Gurkha Engineers whose original Officer Corps was drawn from the three Indian Engineer Corps including the very same Madras Sappers and Miners. MG.

P.S. note McClintock was a QVO Madras Sappers and Miners not a KGO Bengal Sappers and Miners or a Royal Bombay Sappers and Miners. Bangalore being in the old Madras Presidency.

[Guest]

Hello again - Some further research in Col Sandes' other book on the Indian Corps: "The Indian Sappers and Miners" (pub 1948) reveals some more about McClintock and the Bangalore Torpedo.

1. in 1898 Lt R L McClintock commanded a company of volunteers from the Madras Corps to Nigeria with the West Aftrican Frontier Force . He was an RE officer who transferred to the Madras Sappers and Miners in 1905 after service in South Africa. (page 317)

2. Page 446 under "Trench Warfare Equipment" in Chapter The Great War: France and Belgium 1914-1915. The Battye Bomb, named after Capt B C Battye RE of the 21st Coy Bombay Sappers and Miners who initiated its manufacture in some ironwortks in Bethune. It was based on the design of a rifle grenade made at Bangalore before the (Great) War by Maj R L McClintock RE when Superintendent of Instruction of the Madras Corps and consisted of a small cast iron cylinder, closed at one end with serrations on the outside. ...the list continues through the "hair-brush" grenade, jam-pot variety.. it goes on to say;

"

The Indian Corps in France known as the Indian Expeditionary Force "A" owed much of the pre-war ingenuity shown by Maj R L McClintock RE in the workshops in Bangalore. About 1907

¹

he began designing his "Bangalore Torpedo" and elongated portable container of explosive which could be pushed into a barbed wire entanglement and used to destroy it and during 1911-12 he improved the torpedo and he designed a simple hand grenade and a rifle grenade of the Hales type which could be manufactured rapidly in the field from materials and explosives carried normally by a Sappers and Miners Company

²

. The Bangalore Torpedo of the 1912 pattern was made of thin sheet-iron tubes, capable of being used singly or fitted together to produce a torpedo of considerable length

³

.

Footnotes:

1

. In notes sent to the author on Nov 17th 1937 Lt Col W D B Conran RE states that he fired the first Bangalore Torpedo in 1907 when serving with the 10th Coy Madras Sappers and Miners under Bt Maj R L McClintock

2.

Historical records of the QVO Madras Sappers and Miners Vol II 1910-1914 p.32

3

. "The Destruction of Wire Entanglements. A Suggested Method" by Bt Maj R L McClintock DSO RE appearing in the RE Journal Vol XVII Jan-Jun 1913 pp 129-127

It continues with a list of other improvised trench warfare greandes and rifle greandes and experiments with star-shells and wire-cutters as an attachment to the bayonet etc. and provides references for RE Journal articles on Extemporized Hand Grenade, Extemporized Rifle Grenade and Rifle Attachment Wire Cutter beiween 1913 and 1915. He appears to have been quite inventive. During the War he left for the East Africa front on March 31st 1915 (page 537) and was later the CRE of the 2nd East African Division in 1916 (page 543). Another footnote records in 1917 Lt Col R L McClintock RE became A D W (E)

So, after all that, I would settle on 1907 in Bangalore. Note no mention of the Boer War etc... I hope this helps.

Regards MG

Ubique

[laurent59]

Thank you very much at alls for your very very interesting replies who have many help me.

it's interesting to see that the veteran's accounts are not always true, and can include some mistake.

I know that some extemporized Hand Grenade was manufactured in a professional school in Armentières between the end of 1914 to nearly 1915.

Does somebody have some information too on it ?

Thank you again for your knowledges.

Kind regards

Laurent

[mctaz]

Hi Laurent,

I think perhaps Cpl Biggs' account may have some truth in it, in that it was the first time it had been used by the 40th Bn, or maybe even the 3rd Div.

Initially he did write that it was the ingenious invention of Lt Frank Green,(avec son ingénieuse invention) but he did correct that & stated that:

"The version of the incident as recorded above, is not accurate. That version was the story going around the the trenches at the time. When Frank Green read it, he wrote to me to correct it with the factual account"..

"The Bangalore torpedo was provided by the 3rd Div Engineers. They sent the torpedo to the Brigade for a test. A senior officer of the Brigade was sent late in the afternoon, to the 40th Battalion, with orders for it to be used the next night by Lt Green. In Frank's opinion he was chosen because they believed that whoever used the topedo would be killed or taken prisoner. The torpedo was 25 feet long, and needed 2 men to carry it. Corporal John Linnell was chosen by Lt Green, because he was a good soldier and a former classmate. The device was transported across No Man's Land and gently pushed under the enemy wire, from where you could hear the Germans talking in their trench. A fuse cord of about 100 feet was attached to the torpedo and drawn into our trenches. Lt Green, lit the fuse and after a short time the torpedo exploded with a big bang, and 20 yards of barbed wire was destroyed. The Boche had no idea what had happened but started to shell our lines...."

I've seen them used by Engineers in the Australian Army in excercises in the 80's. Some were obviously "vintage" (perhaps WW2) but others were improvised.

They were detonated by either fuse or det cord.

Jim