Ineffective British Artillery

[nigelfe]

Proper coast artillery had smart intruments like depression or other types of rangefinder. Predictors had also been invented by an RGA officer some 40 yrs earlier that allowed the target ship to be tracked, take continuous range data and aim-off automatically calculated.

Field arty would not have this, possibly except for some short base range finders. Obviously they would use direct fire with their telescope (which is what a tank has, and is provided today and has been used in Afghanistan by artillery). There is very little prospect of hitting a moving target today with indirect fire, apart from relying on luck there was no chance in 1915. Obviously ships at anchor were easy targets and well suited to direct fire.

Bringing field arty into action in the days of horse was very easy, not least because the gun had to be light enough to be towed by a 6 horse team, effectively limiting the gun weight to about 35 cwt give or take, which also meant it was relatively easy to manhandle. This meant carefully edging it forward using scub for cover and avoiding the skyline would be relatively easy to get into a position in sight of the ships undetected. As I said direct fire means you don't need to have directors, aiming points, do any computations, etc, etc. It is no different to a tank or anti-tank gun.

Field and horse artillery were mobile, they didn't plan to stay long in any position because until indirect fire was adopted they had to keep moving to where they could see the enemy, cavalry, ships, infantry, windmills, who cares they're all targets. If you want to have some fantasy about 'shoot and scoot' in WW1 that's your business, but the term wasn't invented until well after WW2 and frequent rapid movement was the artillery norm until the W Front.

[sheldrake]

After reading a book ( Loos 1915 by Nick Lloyd ) in which the bombardment of the German front line left the barbed wire vitually intact why nine months later did the same happen on the Somme.Was there something wrong with the shells ie wrong type,if so why didnt they learn after Loos or were the guns too lightweight?

Duncan

One paragraph. The big lesson the British took away from Loos was that it WAS possible to break through the German lines, with adequate numbers of guns and shells. French was sacked not for the failure to break in, cut wire on much of the attack front, but for the failure to exploit the success in the Hill 70 area. There was no question of cutting all the wire. Concentrated shrapnel could cut lanes in the wire -- given time and enough ammunition. but in 1915 there wasn't enough artillery ammunition They thought that once the shell shortage had been resolved they had the resources to succeed.

There were other lessons that they did not learn. The apparent success of the 15th and 47th Divisions in rushing the first and second lines led to the fateful decision to try to take both lines on the 1st day of the Somme. Nor was there over much much concern about the details of the "time and space " aspects of artillery preparation and support. The problems of cutting the wire protecting the Germans second line was ignored. Minute amounts of artillery ammunition were supposed to provide effective counter battery fire. Fatally, no one picked up the painful lessons the French were learning about the need for the infantry to be on the heels of the barrage - close enough to lose troops to friendly fire.

I am organising a battlefield tour to the Somme looking at the artillery and commemorating the start of the Somme - the opening barrage. Details here. http://baldwinbattlefieldtours.com/gunnertours/tours/somme-centenary

[new3.2]

Perhaps another idea- By 11/11/18 the AEF had landed in France, 49 US manufactured 6-inch Newton/Stokes mortars. American Munitions (I think that was the source) that these trench mortars were used for destroying barbed wire. Was this learned from the Brits, or their own conclusion?

Ken

[Old Tom]

The BEF was using 6" Mortars well before the AEF appeared.

Old Tom