egbert Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 What part is this from, please? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KONDOA Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 Not specifically recognised but looks like a sheared rivet in which case it could be from anything including the current farmers plough. Second thoughts !! Theres a problem with the scale for that suggestion oops!! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Morgan Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 The wide-angle (?) shot distorts it a bit, but it looks like the piston from a shrapnel-shell, with the broken-off lower end of the flash-tube still attached. Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Tulloch-Marshall Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 Bottom portion of a Stokes Mortar bomb, - the bit where the Ely cartridge fitted. I think ! regards - Tom Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tom Morgan Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 Bottom portion of a Stokes Mortar bomb, - the bit where the Ely cartridge fitted. I think ! regards - Tom Yes - I think that's more like it. I think I can see the perforations around the cartridge tube too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Poilu Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 Yep, looks like the propellant end of a 3" stokes. If you clean up the end you may well find the Eley cartridge remains still in there and the name still visible. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnreed Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 This one has not been cleaned, its still live. John Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
303man Posted 29 August , 2004 Share Posted 29 August , 2004 Do not touch however innocent I can send a photo off forum of the results of when it all goes wrong with something explosive messy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Brummy Posted 30 August , 2004 Share Posted 30 August , 2004 Do not touch however innocent I can send a photo off forum of the results of when it all goes wrong with something explosive messy. Seconded and if anybody has a good photograph of of the full projectile please post it. the stokes morter is one of the most dangerouse things around the Somme an Salient, due to it not looking like an explosive shell. I have lost count of the number of first time visitors to the battle fields who have picked one of these up, thinking it to be part of an artillary piece or a machine gun rather than a item of ordinance. The more people who know what these look like the better. Brum Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
303man Posted 30 August , 2004 Share Posted 30 August , 2004 3 inch Stokes line picture Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
303man Posted 30 August , 2004 Share Posted 30 August , 2004 The men themselves fuzeing Stokes bombs near Ypres (Whitesheet) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Brummy Posted 30 August , 2004 Share Posted 30 August , 2004 Cheers 303 man. Brum Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Somme1916 Posted 30 August , 2004 Share Posted 30 August , 2004 egbert, Location question. Is that Mill Road Cemetery and Theipval Wood in the background? Jon Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Reed Posted 30 August , 2004 Share Posted 30 August , 2004 Yes Jon, it is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
egbert Posted 31 August , 2004 Author Share Posted 31 August , 2004 egbert, Location question. Is that Mill Road Cemetery and Theipval Wood in the background? Jon Jon, Bois d'Authuille; Schwaben Redoubt in backgound; Thiepval is to the right Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 31 August , 2004 Share Posted 31 August , 2004 Having worked for the Ministry of defence in the 1960s and 1970s in the field of land service ammunition, I learned a lot about WWII ammunition because, although a lot of it was obsolete or obsolescent by then, there were still large stocks. From this experience, I suppose I would have assumed that a Stokes Mortar bomb was similar to what became the 3" Mortar bomb after WWI, with a recogniseable rounded shape, nose percussion fuze, tail fin and so on. Looks like I was way off. I did a quick google search and came up with these: http://www.worldwar1.com/dbc/smortar.htm http://riv.co.nz/rnza/hist/mortar/mort7.htm http://www.firstworldwar.com/weaponry/mortars.htm http://www.firstworldwar.com/bio/stokes.htm http://www.1914-1918.net/trenchmortars.htm http://www.diggerhistory.info/pages-weapon...-ww1-allied.htm All useful links, but not good on ammunition. From the drawing, the fuze looks something like the sort of combustion time fuze fitted to a grenade with a safety pin and striker. Is this correct? If so, did the barrel act to contain a fly off lever until it was fired? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Poilu Posted 31 August , 2004 Share Posted 31 August , 2004 The fuse assembly on a Stokes is indeed an adaptation of the standard Mills grenade assembly with a fly off lever. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
KIRKY Posted 31 August , 2004 Share Posted 31 August , 2004 Hi is the fuse end on a Stokes dangerous as I have seen quite a few on The Somme? Were they removed from the main body as I found several "heads" together near Quarry Cementry. They appeared to still have the pin inserted? tony Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Max Poilu Posted 31 August , 2004 Share Posted 31 August , 2004 As stated by many above the general advice regarding all munitions or parts of munitions has to be to leave well alone. Obviously shell shards, shrapnel balls etc are a different matter - there has to be a degree of common sense here rather than paranoia. The propellant end as first illustrated at the beginning of this thread is almost certainly totally safe as it has almost certainly become detached during detonation. All it would now contain is the empty shotgun cartridge free of any explosive or primer material. But almost certainly is not good enough and therfore unless you know absolutely what you are dealing with everything should be left well alone despite my earlier point that it could easily be cleaned. The fused end without the detonation tube attached might still contain a small percussion cap which is potentially dangerous. If the long brass tube is still attached this has a length of bickford fuse with a detonator at the end. The detonator could easily remove a large chunk of your hand or worse. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Marco Posted 31 August , 2004 Share Posted 31 August , 2004 Seconded and if anybody has a good photograph of of the full projectile please post it See http://www.xs4all.nl/~aur/Debris/Munitions.htm 2/3 rds down on the page. Regards, Marco Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Paul Reed Posted 31 August , 2004 Share Posted 31 August , 2004 Bois d'Authuille; Schwaben Redoubt in backgound; Thiepval is to the right What the French called "bois d'authuille" (Authuille Wood) is what the British call Thiepval Wood - to us Authuille Wood is what the French call "Bois de la Haie". Confused yet? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
303man Posted 31 August , 2004 Share Posted 31 August , 2004 If you look at the picture I posted earlier of the soldiers fuzeing the Stokes Mortar rounds, the front left man has the Bickford fuze between his fingers like a cigarette. This is the Text book way of holding a detonater. We still teach serving Royal Engineers undergoing Demolition Training to hold Det's in this way. All detonators have a buisness end and either an open end for Safety Fuze (Flash Det) or 2 Wires for electrical initiation and the det should be held at the non buisness end. Remember some ordnance may have been tampered with (Booby Trapped) to go off immediatly it is moved. An instantanious fuze was made for the mills bomb but my belief is it was only used in the far east in WW2 explicitly for Booby Traps. War Story Just after the Falklands war I was looking around some old Argie Trenches in an area near the Port Stanley Race course an area supposidly cleared of all unexploded ordnance. I jumped into a fire trench that had previously been flooded you could tell by the tide line in the peat as my foot sank into the mud there was a Round American tennis ball type grenade in a tin, pin out and piece of wire classic booby trap. I am still here the sticky mud at the bottom of the trench saved the day. LEAVE NOTHING TO CHANCE one of my nine lives went that day plus a good pair of undies! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 1 September , 2004 Share Posted 1 September , 2004 The detonator could easily remove a large chunk of your hand or worse. The British army used to - still may - do a demonstration to people starting off demolitions training which involved taping a standard demolition detonator to the neck of an artillery cartridge case and setting it off with safety fuze. The resultant explosion would cause considerable damage to the neck of the case and usually split it open. And I once saw a photograph of someone's hand taken minutes after a detonator they were holding had gone off - some of the bone left, but no flesh and it was later amputated up to the elbow. There is no need to be paranoid about this, but there is a need to know what you are doing and just remember that 90 years have not necessarily made them safe. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted 1 September , 2004 Share Posted 1 September , 2004 Looking at the pictures, I have tried to work out what the two safety pins were for and this seems to be the way it worked: One pin goes through a piece of brass which retains the fly off lever. This the uppermost one in the detailed photograph Even if this pin was removed, the fly off lever would still be retained. So, the piece of brass must be a spring loaded plunger, called a detent, which "sets back" due to the force of firing, releasing the fly off lever. This is the force which pushes you back in a car seat under acceleration and it is one of the properties used in most safety/arming devices in artillery and mortar fuzes. When the fly off lever is clear, it has finished serving its purpose of retaining the spring loaded striker, when then flips through an arc about its axis and strikes a percussion cap to ignite the safety fuze. It looks to me as though the second safety pin, the bottom one in the detailed photograph, retains the striker until just before use as. I would venture to suggest that one would be removed when ready to fire and the second as part of the act of dropping the bomb down the tube. The detailed photograph does not show any safety fuze or a detonator. Were these supplied separately, to be fitted as required, as happened with Mills grenades? Most HE mortar bombs, even today, have an integral safety pin. Being smooth bore weapons, they cannot use centrifugal force as one of the forces to operate internal safety devices, so they are intrinsically less safe in transit and storage, without a safety pin, than artillery ammunition. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ArmyOfficer Posted 1 September , 2004 Share Posted 1 September , 2004 What the French called "bois d'authuille" (Authuille Wood) is what the British call Thiepval Wood - to us Authuille Wood is what the French call "Bois de la Haie". Confused yet? thanks Paul....now I'm having to change the captions on over 15 photos... Who knew? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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