US 3-inch mountain howitzer, Model 1911

[Hoplophile]

Prior to World War I, the US Army made extensive use of the Vickers 2.95-inch (75mm) mountain gun. However, as this piece had the distressing habit of jumping into the air when fired, thereby necessitating relaying with every shot, the US Ordnance Department decided to design a new piece to replace it. known as the "3-inch mountain howitzer", this new piece would be more stable, have the ability to fire at higher angles (and thus longer ranges), and use the same family of 3-inch projectiles that was being developed for the standard US field gun of the time.

The first prototype of this new weapon seems to have been a bit of disappointment. (In his annual report for 1910, the US Chief of Ordnance wrote that "test of the new 3-inch mountain howitzer and carriage has indicated the need for certain improvements.") So, a second prototype was built. This, however, is where the trail goes cold. The last mention I have been able to find is the in the annual report of the Chief of Ordnance for 1912, which describes plans to test this new version of the weapon.

Has anyone seen a handbook for this piece, or some other official acknowledgment of its existence?

To further complicate matters, there is a 3-inch mountain howitzer on display at the Fort Sill Museum. This piece, however, is marked as a Model 1920. That, to me at least, makes little sense, as the "caliber board" of 1919 had already decided to stop designing pieces to use 3-inch ammunition and all postwar references that I can find to mountain or pack howitzers make explicit reference to models that use 75mm ammunition.

Does anyone out there know anything about this mysterious weapon?

[Pete1052]

A Korean War veteran who was in a pack 75mm battery told me the tubes had to be re-layed after they had been fired. It may not have been official doctrine but it may have been necessary from a practical standpoint. Perhaps the end of the trail has to be dug in a bit.

Fort Detrick, Maryland has a pack 75 by its flagpole that is used for firing blanks when the flag is lowered. A retired colonel told me that in the 1970s the post had to cancel a planned parachute jumping demonstration by the Golden Knights at the very last moment. The parachute team got its revenge by stuffing the 75mm tube full of feathers.

[Tom W.]

Page 17 of this manual mentions a 3-inch mountain howitzer, Model 1911.

http://books.google.com/books?id=ecQqAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Safety+features+of+firing+and+breech+mechanisms+of+field,+siege&hl=en&ei=4WeCTZr-FYyksQP459n9AQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=1&ved=0CCgQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false

[Tom W.]

This is from the Encyclopedia Britannica New Volumes, Volume 31, "Ordnance," by Colonel F. M. Richard (London and New York: the Encyclopedia Britannica Company, 1922), page 1193:

[Hoplophile]

Thank you again, Gentlemen, for the additional information.

The 1911 model certainly existed. How many were made, however, is another question. In addition to being mentioned in the manual on safety mechanisms, detailed instructions for the machining of cartridge cases for it can be found in Ethan Viall's book on the manufacture of American artillery ammunition.

It is interesting to note that the small number of mountain pieces sent to France with the AEF were all 2.95-inch Vickers guns.

The 1920 model described in the encyclopedia article seems to be the one on display at the Fort Sill museum.

The mystery continues!

[Hoplophile]

The 1907 Model of the 3-inch mountain howitzer was used in the Fort Riley experiments of October 1909, which served both to test experimental field pieces and study various types of field fortifications.

The 1907 Model of the 4.7-inch howitzer was also tested in this experiment.

[Hoplophile]

Thanks to the intrepid inter-library loan librarian at the Gray Research Center (here in beautiful downtown Quantico, Virginia, USA), I am now aware of a place where one can download a remarkable catalogue published by Bethlehem Steel Company in 1916. This is the best single source that I have yet to find on the "system of mobile artillery" that was being developed by the US Army Ordnance Department between 1905 and 1917.

This catalogue contains, among many other things, a description of what looks to be the Model 1911 mountain howitzer. (Unfortunately, the catalogue does not use official US Army nomenclature, to the point of calling the weapon in question a "mountain gun.")

[Pete1052]

As a former soldier who later worked as a contractor supporting U.S. Army medical R & D programs, when the bug of Civil War gun collecting bit me two decades ago I was intrigued by how such a small U.S. Army Ordnance Department establishment of regular officers during 1861-1865 accomplished as much as it did. Though they made some mistakes they also got the main things right. Some of the surplus arms imported from Europe that were bought in a hurry in 1862 were of poor quality or in obscure calibers; on the other hand the U.S. M1861 Rifle-Musket, caliber .58, was a standard model made with machine tools by multiple manufacturers that was subjected to rigorous quality and inspection standards. The parts of the M1861 all interchanged with each other without filing or fitting no matter where they were made, whether by U.S. Army Springfield Armory or by any of the many commercial manufacturers. The P1853 Enfield in .577 from Birmingham and London, most of them made by hand to slightly looser tolerances, was the major substitute-standard weapon North and South.

At the time the Enfield Arsenal that supplied the British Army with its small arms used machine tools, many bought in America, for their manufacture. In around 1858 when they were setting up the mechanized manufacturing lines there they employed American advisors on how best to use them. One of those guys, the former U.S. Army Harpers Ferry Armory engineer James Burton, later became a top guy in Confederate Ordnance. On the other hand the Birmingham and London gun trades who exported to America during the Civil War used the old hand-made methods or combinations of the old hand-made and mechanized new, like the ridiculously expensive bespoke British shotguns of today.

Some British gunmakers today seem to think that the more they raise their prices the more desirable their products become. They're selling to an ever-vanishing aristocratic niche market and wanna-be bounder rich people. Forget that stuff, I'll take a Remington or Winchester.

Edit: More historical detail added, 3/31/11, 1800 hrs my time East Coast U.S.

[Hoplophile]

It is this history of organizational excellence that makes the question of the fate of the "system of mobile artillery" so interesting. On the one hand, it looks as if the US Ordnance Department is developing all sorts of interesting and innovative pieces, all of which feature state-of-the-art recoil systems and some of which even have split trails. On the other hand, out of three guns and three howitzers, only one (the 4.7-inch gun) find a home in the AEF. Of the remaining pieces, moreover, only one (the 3-inch gun) sees active service (in Nicaragua in 1912, in Pershing's expedition to Mexico in 1916, and on the Mexican border), and that piece was based on a German (Ehrhardt) design. I also find it interesting that, while the "system of mobile artillery" had two light field howitzers (the 3.8-inch and the 4.7-inch), neither of these pieces made it into the tables of organization and equipment (establishments) written for the AEF. Instead, the AEF went to war without any light field howitzers at all.

[Pete1052]

It was probably a funding shortfall. U.S. Army Ordnance had never lacked for technical expertise until Bob McNamara decided they had gotten too big for their britches and decided to take them down several notches after the M14 and M16 affairs. He thought private industry was cheaper than costly in-house U.S. Government institutional sources of expertise.

At the time he was Secretary of Defense U.S. Army Ordnance had a sprawling empire of depots and arsenals that he wanted to shut down to save money, and he also didn't want to have small arms engineers at Springfield Armory arguing with him and his management genuises about technical things like choice of caliber. If you study the M1 Rifle and Carbine you'll find that many of them were rebuilt/refurbished after World War II at depots all across the land that were later closed down by McNamara as a cost-saving measure.

[Pete1052]

Bruce, there's a book you have to read: Harpers Ferry and the New Technology by Merritt Roe Smith, available here. It's about how U.S. Army Ordnance introduced the production of small arms using machine tools during the 1840s before anyone else did. (Alas, Britain and Europe copied us within 10 to 30 years.)

[Hoplophile]

I know this book well. It is one of my all-time favorites. I've even assigned it in class.

[Pete1052]

Civil War Guns by William B. Edwards is also good for deep background. Though it's mainly about the small arms of the war, the author occasionally digresses into the way the arms industry and Ordnance establishment function in modern times, or at least the way they were in 1962 when the book was published. He also wrote a lot about the Ordnance establishments North and South during the war.

The effect is to make the subject come alive, like the things they were doing in the Civil War could have easily happened during World War II or the Korean War. The way he presents his material the Ordnance officers, gun designers and manufacturers weren't old dead guys in history, they were regular guys doing real things. The book as well as its author are eclectic but the author was/is a genuis in certain a rough-hewn way.