The 9.2", origins

[Old Tom]

The 9.2" howitzer was, I understand, the first piece of siege artillery deployed by the BEF. The first was called 'Mother'and was the first production equipment ordered by the War Office. I believe that the 9.2" how is modeled as part of the RA memorial in London.

I am currently reading about various aspects of Anglo German affairs in the years before the war including some information on the expansion of the RN. I note that some warships of the era mounted 9.2" guns. This sparked a train of thought 'why 9.2"'. As far as I know most naval guns came in calibres of whole numbers of inches and assume that the 9.2 was introduced to meet the need for a gun more powerful than the 6" without the weight of the 10" and 12". I also assume that the manufacturer of the 9.2" naval gun also made the 9.2; how. I realise that gun barrels are different from howitzer barrels, but assume that the machining of the two would use the same tools.

Can anyone give me a steer as to why the 9.2 calibre was chosen?

Old Tom

[truthergw]

Is it a rough conversion from a 24cm.? ( It's very close)

[David B]

Tom,

The origins of the 9.2 inch gun appear to have occurred in the late 1870's when British authorities wanted to have a gun to match Krupp's 24cm weapon. Apparently the ideal size for this was found in

the 9.2 inch size and various marks of this calibre were produced and eventually evolved in coastal defence weapons by the late 1800's. I presume that the 9.2 howitzer was a natural progression of this.

Note that the shell size was given as 380 pounds and for high angle firing there was a 290 pound "light"shell. The 290 pound shell was the weight used in the howitzer. Ease of manufacturing may have

followed on from this. The following article may explain the evolvement of this size.

Cheers David

http://en.academic.ru/dic.nsf/enwiki/11306870

[SiegeGunner]

'Short' 9.2s were never very successful in naval service and ships equipped with longer marks of 9.2 were themselves rapidly superseded by vessels with heavier armament or more efficient guns of smaller calibre. Short 9.2s were largely redeployed to coastal defence, while some long 9.2s were mounted as railway guns and others were installed on land mounts for service with the RN Siege Guns on the Belgian coast.

[Old Tom]

Many thanks. Can't raise the cited website at the moment. Will try later.

Old Tom

[MikB]

'Short' 9.2s were never very successful in naval service and ships equipped with longer marks of 9.2 were themselves rapidly superseded by vessels with heavier armament or more efficient guns of smaller calibre. Short 9.2s were largely redeployed to coastal defence, while some long 9.2s were mounted as railway guns and others were installed on land mounts for service with the RN Siege Guns on the Belgian coast.

They were effectively overtaken by the Dreadnought concept in naval weaponry. Had the British ever built a large armoured cruiser analogous to the German 'Blucher', it would probably have had 10 or 12 9.2s. Ironically the 'Blucher' was built in misinformed response to the expectation that Britain was building just such a ship - whereas in fact it was the first of the 12" armed battlecruisers that were on the stocks.

As it was, the 9.2 was mainly employed in single mountings fore-and-aft in older armoured cruisers like the Good Hopes - and in small numbers like that it could never offset the fact that the bulk of the armament was of 6" calibre. Faced with German armoured cruisers with 8.2" guns, but 8 of them instead of 2, the outcome at Coronel in some respects reflected the pre-Dreadnought lack of attention to armament.

Regards,

MikB

[nigelfe]

9.2 inch was selected as the heaviest coast arty gun in 1900, and this was confirmed by the Owen Cttee in 1906 which considered the implications of the 'all big-gun battleship'. The 1914 the standard 9.2 gun in RGA service was the Mark X (on Mk V mounting). This had 445 inch barrel and 380 lb APHE shell, some Mk VI were still around with 310 inch barrel and 290 lb shell. 9.2 inch How was 134 and 170 inch barrel (Mks I & II) with 290 lb shell.