Dum Dum Bullets

[NigelS]

Thanks MikB and TonyE for your detailed response to my queries, very informative.

NigelS

[Doug Johnson]

"The London Scottish in the Great War" Lt-Col J H Lindsay; 1925

Chapter III Messines

The rifles were the Mark 1 converted to take Mark VII ammunition. Not till the Battalion were in action was it discovered that the magazine had too weak a spring, and its front stop clips were of the wrong shape for the Mark VII bullet. This caused refusal of the cartridge to enter the chamber of the barrel, for either the point of the bullet came too low and hit the lower part of the breach entrance and jammed there, or it jumped and hit the top of the breach entrance , sometimes breaking off the point of the bullet. It was certainly a serious matter for the men opening fire in their first battle to find their rifles jamming and the magazines failing to act. The magazines were useless and the rifles had to be used as single-loaders.

Perhaps a clearer view of the issue from someone who knew what he was talking about rather than from someone who doesn't!

NB it is not likely that Lindsay was aware of Henderson's trouble with dum dums. This particular issue would not have been around later in the war but similar problems may have caused the odd bullet to have its nose damaged and been discarded upon the battlefield. It would only take one or two to have been found by the Germans to have upset them, especially with there being a prior history of such things being found.

Is it possible that there were quality problems causing some cartridges to be less robust than others? This would not necessarily be recorded and could be sorted out locally with the manufacturer or even by the manufacturer themselves. I would be surprised if the speed up in war production did not cause some problems.

Doug

[TonyE]

Perhaps a clearer view of the issue from someone who knew what he was talking about rather than from someone who doesn't!

Doug

If you would care to deny that remark was aimed at either Chris or myself I will continue this dailogue.

Regards

TonyE

[4thGordons]

"The London Scottish in the Great War" Lt-Col J H Lindsay; 1925

Chapter III Messines

The rifles were the Mark 1 converted to take Mark VII ammunition. Not till the Battalion were in action was it discovered that the magazine had too weak a spring, and its front stop clips were of the wrong shape for the Mark VII bullet. This caused refusal of the cartridge to enter the chamber of the barrel, for either the point of the bullet came too low and hit the lower part of the breach entrance and jammed there, or it jumped and hit the top of the breach entrance , sometimes breaking off the point of the bullet. It was certainly a serious matter for the men opening fire in their first battle to find their rifles jamming and the magazines failing to act. The magazines were useless and the rifles had to be used as single-loaders.

Perhaps a clearer view of the issue from someone who knew what he was talking about rather than from someone who doesn't!

NB it is not likely that Lindsay was aware of Henderson's trouble with dum dums. This particular issue would not have been around later in the war but similar problems may have caused the odd bullet to have its nose damaged and been discarded upon the battlefield. It would only take one or two to have been found by the Germans to have upset them, especially with there being a prior history of such things being found.

Is it possible that there were quality problems causing some cartridges to be less robust than others? This would not necessarily be recorded and could be sorted out locally with the manufacturer or even by the manufacturer themselves. I would be surprised if the speed up in war production did not cause some problems.

Doug

Doug - Thanks, I am familiar with this account - and as you say -this described the problem that I was trying to, that in a magazine designed to feed a round nosed bullet it is easy for the pointed MkVII bullet to either ride up too high and jam, or fail to go high enough and wedge below the chamber. Early SMLE magazines had a "stop clip" rivetted to the front side of the magazine to help position the round correctly (this was deleted on later 4th variation magazines -the most common type in MkIII* rifles - I can provide pictures when I get home). "Breaking the point off" here I think probably needs to be interpreted as a bit carefully. As I said, I have a rifle which does this as a result of poor feed (I have also tried to replicate it by using an unmodified MkI rifle with MkVII ammunition and it can indeed dent the tip...maybe shear off a millimeter of so...but if the image created is that the bullet is radically altered (and a whole chunk of the tip is broken off) that has not been my experience. Of course, no one is shooting at me and I am prehaps more gentle than the average soldier might be under field conditions...and certainly jams and even moderate damage to the tip of the round are an important problem (as noted in your first extract - leading to the possibility that the bullet jacket strip off and remain as an obstruction in the barrel.)

Any damage to the lips of the magazine in an SMLE, even one that is designed for the MkVII round can cause feeding problems, and the damage need only be slight to cause issues. I have spent many happy hours (not!) with pliers tweaking the lips on magazines to ensure smooth feeding, I have at least one magazine that has always defeated me.

TonyE is the best source on ammunition quality control problems. There were some, but they most definitely were recorded... in particular there were problems with some American produced ammunition (and this shows up in some memoires too) but I am not sure these problems were to do with feeding/damage but more to do with reliability of propellant and primers. (IIRC they - Winchester? - were not allowed to be used in aircraft machine guns for this reason)

I agree entirely that just a few examples of "modified" rounds would be sufficient "evidence" in the propoganda war. I knew a WWII D-Day veteran who showed me "German Poisoned Bullets" he had picked up behind the beaches and kept as a souvenir. As best I could tell these were wooden bulletted 7.92mm Mauser blanks!

Chris

[MikB]

Perhaps a clearer view of the issue from someone who knew what he was talking about rather than from someone who doesn't!

Doug

I'm with TonyE on that - there was no need to be patronising or insulting.

Besides, a military commander who puts his troops into action using newly-converted rifles with new ammunition - without even a basic sample test - isn't necessarily an authority on anything requiring organised thought.

Regards,

MikB

[Doug Johnson]

The comment meant me!

doug

[Doug Johnson]

Chris,

If Henderson's account is to be believed then the German officer chipped the end of a cartridge off with the hole in the cut out and that he probably did it quite easily. Could you guess at how much it would take off? If it would only take off a millimetre or two then this would replicate that caused by the round being damaged in the breech which, as you say, would still cause a problem when fired, and could therefore be classed as a dum dum by the Germans despite the limited amount of damage. Also, with only a small amount taken off would this be clearly evident amongst the amount of cartridges that would have been strewn around at Messines?

If it is likely to take a large amount off then this suggests the dum dums found by the Germans were not these damaged ones, which might then point to them being made by the troops though it would seem unlikely to me that experienced troops would do that considering the likely effects on the rifle. If the material was quite hard and experiments show that taking the tip off is not easy then it would further suggest that they would be made prior to going into action as I can't imagine anyone making them during, not if it was that difficult. I somehow find it dificult to believe that the ones found by the Germans at Messines were deliberately made (though it is possible that some were made by inexperienced troops later on). If they were not deliberately made and and have almost the entire point broken off rather than just a millimetre or two (the photographs I have seen were of the entire point broken off, though I still can not remember where I saw them) then this would lead to the conclusion that either the force on them was greater than envisaged or that the casing was somehow softer then.

Although there is only verbal evidence from the Germans here that these dum dums were found at Messines, I feel that there was something found and that this is not just a case of propaganda.

Doug

[4thGordons]

Chris,

If Henderson's account is to be believed then the German officer chipped the end of a cartridge off with the hole in the cut out and that he probably did it quite easily. Could you guess at how much it would take off? If it would only take off a millimetre or two then this would replicate that caused by the round being damaged in the breech which, as you say, would still cause a problem when fired, and could therefore be classed as a dum dum by the Germans despite the limited amount of damage. Also, with only a small amount taken off would this be clearly evident amongst the amount of cartridges that would have been strewn around at Messines?

If it is likely to take a large amount off then this suggests the dum dums found by the Germans were not these damaged ones, which might then point to them being made by the troops though it would seem unlikely to me that experienced troops would do that considering the likely effects on the rifle. If the material was quite hard and experiments show that taking the tip off is not easy then it would further suggest that they would be made prior to going into action as I can't imagine anyone making them during, not if it was that difficult. I somehow find it dificult to believe that the ones found by the Germans at Messines were deliberately made (though it is possible that some were made by inexperienced troops later on). If they were not deliberately made and and have almost the entire point broken off rather than just a millimetre or two (the photographs I have seen were of the entire point broken off, though I still can not remember where I saw them) then this would lead to the conclusion that either the force on them was greater than envisaged or that the casing was somehow softer then.

Although there is only verbal evidence from the Germans here that these dum dums were found at Messines, I feel that there was something found and that this is not just a case of propaganda.

Doug

Doug,

I am ridiculously busy tomorrow and Friday however at the weekend I will attempt to replicate these phenomena using an early SMLE rifle and cutoff and standard MkVII ammunition.

There are two "holes" in a cut-off one is the finger grasp that is hollow and into which the point of a bullet can be inserted (see pictures in the earlier thread I linked) the other is a hole machined in the cutoff plate. If this latter were to be used (and the plate itself did not bend!) I suspect a chunk of the tip could be broken off - but I think you would also risk actually unseating the bullet from the case (cue thread on reversed bullets! ).

If I can get my act together I will try to demonstrate this, and the misfeed jams on video and post it on YouTube. At the same time I will try and demonstrate the differences in Magazines etc.

When I tried it before using the cut-off finger grasp (this is apparenly what is referred to in the extract) I bent the bullet tip but did not shear it off...I used quite considerable force. As was pointed out in the earlier thread - would not wire cutters (easily available) do a better job at snipping the tips off? I do not really know how to estimate the degree of force used in this crude experiment - but perhaps the video will demonstrate? Certainly this damage would be somewhat similar to a round damaged by misfeeding but I would think you would really be smashing the bolt home on a misfed round to even come close to shearing the tip of the bullet off as opposed to denting/nicking it a bit (or compressing the bullet into the case!). This damage would not (to my mind) be mistaken for a deliberate, nefarious, modification of the bullet - although it might be perhaps magnified into such by those with an interest in so doing. It would be obvious under close inspection - but not so obvious as to lead to this sort of accusation by an impartial observer

I am not sure about your feeling that "something was found" and this was "more than propoganda" Whilst generally I will subscribe to the idea of no smoke without fire, sometimes the smoke is misleading or deliberately fanned. Would you apply the same logic (i.e. there must be something underlying) to stories of crucified babies/nuns and/or the Angel of Mons (ie because belief in these things was widespread something (other than just journalistic exaggeration) must have been present?) BTW I personally believe there is ample evidence of real German atrocities in the early months of the war however there was also significant fabrication and exaggeration by allied propoganda machines.

Cartridges on a battlefield could be damaged any number of ways (dropped, hit by bullets, blown up by shells etc etc) so (for example)....if a charger of rounds in an ammunition pouch happened to be struck by a shell fragment (or a bullet) the instant before that shell fragment penetrated the unfortunate wearer of the pouch, and in so striking sheared the tip of several bullets in the clip - I suppose it is conceivable that these be mistaken for/morphed into deliberately modified rounds on the person of the wounded soldier...likewise what would the state of a box of .303 hit by a shell be? surely some would be totally destroyed but others may well be split and damaged perhaps including tips missing?

I'll post pictures and vid at the weekend - work willing.

Chris

[TonyE]

The comment meant me!

doug

Fair enough, but it was a rather ambiguous comment!

A few points though:

Chris is quite correct that it would be possible to snub the point of a Mark VII bullet if a misfeed occurred and the bolt was being manipulated fast in the heat of battle. However, as he says, it is unlikely that the bullet tip could be broken off. This is mainly due to the construction of the Mark VII bullet. Under the cupro-nickel envelope, which is itself fairly robust, the tip of the bullet is a piece of solid aluminium extending back about 8-9mm. This can be seen in Dave's (59165) posts #34 and #35. There is no way that this is going to break half way up the aluminium tip, and to break the bullet at its natural fault line where the aluminium meets the main lead core would require too much leverage.

You also mention seeing a charger with rounds where the tip has been bent back. What is the point (sorry) of that? The rounds probably would not strip into the magazine and even if they did would not feed and chamber.

There certainly where quality problems, but they were definitely noticed! The official History of the Ministry of Munitions (Vol.XI, Part VI) deals with this at some length. The problems fell into several categories: lack of experienced labour, shortage of qualified inspectors from Woolwich and the rapid expansion of output.

For British made ammunition, the main result of this was lack of dimensional tolerances rather than failure or weakness in the round itself. Birmingham Metals and Munitions, who produced 1.5 billion rounds of .303 inch ammunition during the war, had a bad patch in 1916 but corrected the problems. Kings Norton (582 million) produced uniformly good ammunition and were regarded as the best manufacturer with Kynoch (2.4 billion) not far behind. The problems of dimensional inaccuracy, particularly if the case shoulder was set too far forward was misfeeds and jams, especially in machine guns.

For American ammunition, there were problems of virtually every kind. The official history comments that cancelling the American contracts would be advantageous due to the high cost and "It was even more desirable from the point of view of the quantity and quality of the supply. The ammunition produced by the United States Cartridge Company (more than 50% of the whole) was regarded by the War Office as suitable for emergency use only, and much of it was sentenced for practice at home." In fact, much was broken down on receipt in the UK and issued as blanks. Large quantities were also supplied to the French for reloading with their own armour piercing bullets for air service.

You can see that although there were problems with quality, it was not to do with weakness but other issues.

If Chris does not have time this weekend to try the trick with the cut-off, I will try it in my SMLE. To add veracity, I will use a couple of WWI vintage cartridges and see what I can do.

Finally, as you know, with the tip cut off there is nothing to stop the core blowing through the envelope and leaving the latter in the barrel. I have posted this before, but this is what happened to one of my rifles when the next round went up the barrel! It was not a Lee-Enfield but that does not matter.

Regards

TonyE

[59165]

If I can get my act together I will try to demonstrate this, and the misfeed jams on video and post it on YouTube. At the same time I will try and demonstrate the differences in Magazines etc.

Chris

Don't forget to comb your hair & clean your nails.

You never know who'll be watching.

[59165]

If Chris does not have time this weekend to try the trick with the cut-off, I will try it in my SMLE. To add veracity, I will use a couple of WWI vintage cartridges and see what I can do.

TonyE

If Chris is using WW1 c/n rounds too,I'm betting my Beano collection that the bullet unseats itself before any bend or snap occurs.

[Andrew Upton]

As was pointed out in the earlier thread - would not wire cutters (easily available) do a better job at snipping the tips off?

...

This damage would not (to my mind) be mistaken for a deliberate, nefarious, modification of the bullet - although it might be perhaps magnified into such by those with an interest in so doing. It would be obvious under close inspection - but not so obvious as to lead to this sort of accusation by an impartial observer

Not every soldier was issued with a pair of wire cutters though - if you're looking to get some good propoganda out of it, it would have to be done with a tool freely available to every soldier. It might not have been it's intended (or actual!) purpose, but the Lee-Enfield cut-off fits the bill.

[TonyE]

Not every soldier was issued with a pair of wire cutters though - if you're looking to get some good propoganda out of it, it would have to be done with a tool freely available to every soldier. It might not have been it's intended (or actual!) purpose, but the Lee-Enfield cut-off fits the bill.

...but the only problem with that is that it was not available to every soldier. From the beginning of 1916 pretty well all the troops going to France would have been armed with an SMLE III* without a cut-off.

In any case I think the cut off theory is a red herring anyway.(but I will try it!)

Regards

TonyE

[Andrew Upton]

...but the only problem with that is that it was not available to every soldier. From the beginning of 1916 pretty well all the troops going to France would have been armed with an SMLE III* without a cut-off.

I know, but most of the accounts of its use as such seem to deal with the pre-1916 period anyway, especially 1914

[TonyE]

Well, I have at least proved Dave's Beano collection is safe!

I conducted the first trial using a rather dirty 1915 Kynoch made round (I chose it because it was of no use in that condition).

First I used the small hole in the plate of the cut-off. The result was about 1mm of cupro-nickel was sheared off the very tip. You will notice in the picture the mark where the bullet was levered against the edge of the hole. Conclusion: not possible to snap the tip off this way.

Next I tried it in the fold of the thumb piece of the cut-off. This time the whole bullet broke away from the case, just as Dave predicted.

However, in the interest of scientific rigour and on the assumption that the WWI round would have become brittle with age, I repeated the second test using a "modern" British military .303 from the last year of production, 1973. This time, using a great deal of force (and wary of breaking the rifle) I managed to cut the tip off the envelope, but it did not cut through the aluminium tip, nor did the bullet break at the joint of the aluminium and lead cores. Conclusion: yes it broke a piece off, but nowhere near anything that has been alleged. The bent tip of the aluminium core can be seen protruding still.

I think we can consign the cut-off theory to myth.

Regards

TonyE

[TonyE]

Here are the other pictures

[shippingsteel]

I think we can consign the cut-off theory to myth.

Regards

TonyE

Well done TonyE - the "Mythbusters" would be so proud .....

Cheers, S>S

[59165]

Nice job,Tony!

I dunno if I'd have the guts to put full pressure on a cutoff of me own.

As to the lead problems,a good mate (this ties in to what Mr.Centurion mentioned) has told me that the white smeginess on my dug rounds is lead oxide & can work like 'lead cancer'.

If I ever get to shoot in France again,I will clean it out & refill with some melted shrapnel balls.Should do the trick & help against any imbalance.

We,ve done some great & original practical tests on this forum but,there remains one that is a must...............reversed rounds against shields & sandbags.

I'll get to work on that soon.

[b_wilkin]

As long as I'm on the subject of the origin of words, the English word cartridge came from the French word "cartouche," meaning something which surrounds or encloses something else. The term goes back to when black powder and ball cartouches / cartridges were wrapped in combustible paper. Today cartouche jewelry usually means a medallion of some sort which has a box or border surrounding the image in the center.

And that's why the egyptian hierogliphics enclosed in an elongated oval (used for the names of the kings) are also called cartouches.

[Tom W.]

Not to defend the notion of humane or inhumane weapons but I think there was propaganda to be made from the fact that Dum Dums were prohibited. There were attempts to sidestep the convention against gas, I forget the actual arguments but it was to the effect that the gas as used did not contravene any convention. Flamethrowers I do not know about. Perhaps Bob Lembke or Tom W could enlighten us on the legal position. I believe there were protests at the use of shotguns as trench clearers?

Neither cloud gas nor flamethrowers were prohibited by the Hague Conventions of 1899 and 1907, for the simple reason that the technology of both barely existed.

Declaration II of the Conventions states in part: "The Contracting Powers agree to abstain from the use of projectiles the object of which is the diffusion of asphyxiating or deleterious gases." The German therefore said that releasing gas from cylinders wasn't covered by the Hague Conventions, since the gas wasn't inside projectiles. Later in the war, of course, gas shells were used by both sides, in violation of the Conventions.

In 1907 flamethrowers had only just been invented and were still being tested in secret by the Germans, so they weren't covered by the Hague Convention. However, before the Allies armed themselves with flamethrowers, they tried to argue that the weapons were in fact chemical instead of incendiary, which would violate the Conventions. This is why you see so many contemporary Allied reports, articles, and photos that depict flamethrowers as "gas projectors."

Declaration III of the Conventions states in part: "The Contracting Parties agree to abstain from the use of bullets which expand or flatten easily in the human body, such as bullets with a hard envelope which does not entirely cover the core, or is pierced with incisions." This would ban dum-dums.

Trench-sweeping shotguns weren't banned, but the Germans made the argument that the soft lead of the 12-gauge pellets contravened Declaration III.

[59165]

Whilst cleaning rounds up in the shed in France last week, I did a similar test to Tony's but,not having a Lee En with cut off any more,I used the vice.

This is what happened;-

As you can see in the 2nd photo,the case is now useless & even what is left of the now'dumdum' is basically unfireable.

Not having to worry about busting an expensive rifle,I was able to put a huge amount of pressure on the round in the vice.This one started snapping the c/n but it took another attempt to get it to this state.

[59165]

& this one was a first for me.............

The c/n parted company from the lead & case.The cart was virtually indestructible (as in the last photos).

Both were Kynock VII 16.A good batch,methinks.

[59165]

Good news is that I don't have to refill any bullets as I found that those from a Vickers belt I had,they all seem to have survived the lead oxidisation.Bit of a clean up & they'll be up to standard.sort of...

[59165]

Interesting,the diference between them all.

[59165]

Oh.Forgot to say.

Looks like the Beano's will have to go but,there is no way that a dum dum was made adhoc in the trenches from a .303.

No way