Big Howitzer

[Guest]

Actually its an 18-inch Howitzer not an 18-inch Gun.

Thanks for the correction. The clue of course was the 10 ft sign next to it in the first pic. "Railway Howitzer". To be honest I always thought a howitzer was a sub-group of the gun. Now I know better. Thanks. Title amended. MG

[SiegeGunner]

A long range 18-inch Gun was developed at army instigation in WW1, however by 1918 the army had lost interest and the three guns built were transferred to RN who fitted them to the General Wolfe class monitors.

Source for 'at army instigation', Nigel? My understanding is that the 18" guns were always a naval design and project, made by Elswick for HMS Furious and mounted fore and aft in single-gun turrets which were then later removed, the first when she was converted into a seaplane carrier and the second when she underwent a further conversion into an aircraft carrier. These guns, together with the spare, were then made available to Admiral Sir Reginald Bacon, commanding the Dover Patrol, who had plans .... if the 3rd Ypres/Passchendaele offensive was successful .... to mount two of them inside the walls of the Palace Hotel at Westende to bombard the lock gates and canal at Zeebrugge. Bacon being Bacon, he also had a 'Plan B', which was to mount the guns on the Lord Clive-class 12" monitors General Wolfe, Lord Clive and Prince Eugene, and dual-purpose land/sea mountings were therefore commissioned. When Westende was not taken, the mountings were optimised for use on the monitors and the first gun was mounted on General Wolfe, which opened her account on 28 September 1918 and fired a total of 81 rounds before the war ended. Lord Clive fired four rounds on 13 October 1918, by which time the land campaign was already moving out of range, and she was not used again.

Bacon wrote at length about the 18" guns in his books on the Dover Patrol.

[nigelfe]

Hogg, Allied Artillery of WW1.

[nigelfe]

Thanks for the correction. The clue of course was the 10 ft sign next to it in the first pic. "Railway Howitzer". To be honest I always thought a howitzer was a sub-group of the gun. Now I know better. Thanks. Title amended. MG

Strictly speaking a Gun has a single fixed propelling charge, ie as in coast, naval, AA guns and tanks, not forgetting 18-pr, 60-pr and a few others of WW1 period. Howitzers have variable propelling charges, the advantages of this and improving technology led to the death of the true Gun for filed artillery. Ignoring the handful of WW1 super heavy and WW2 AA and ATk, UK artillery has not developed a Field Gun since the 60-pr over a century ago. 155mm FH-70/AS-90 Howitzers with 95lb shell have a max muzzle velocity close to 50% greater than 60-pr, basically the result of 60 yrs engineering progress.

[centurion]

I think you are getting confused with Quick Firing .guns which had a single fixed charge but some Breech Loading guns still used bagged charges and might be used with with a full charge or a reduced charge depending on circumstances. Howitzers capable of higher angled indirect fire used a bagged charge as the size of the charge would affect the trajectory. See the sectioni on ammunition in Allied Artillery of World War one (Hogg) .

[Guest]

A lifetime ago I once spent a summer with the OTC at Sennybridge as a No.4 on a Pack Howitzer. A truly remarkable piece of kit. I do recall the multiple bag charges and the incredible noise.

On topic - many thanks for your responses. I have Len Trawin's "Early British Quick Firing Artillery" which has some simply wonderful technical drawings of the 4.5 inch Howitzer and the QF 4.5 inch Howitzer Mk I.

MG

[TonyE]

I think you are getting confused with Quick Firing .guns which had a single fixed charge but some Breech Loading guns still used bagged charges and might be used with with a full charge or a reduced charge depending on circumstances. Howitzers capable of higher angled indirect fire used a bagged charge as the size of the charge would affect the trajectory. See the sectioni on ammunition in Allied Artillery of World War one (Hogg) .

I disagree. As far as I am aware,"reduced charges" for guns, whether QF or bagged were made up at the loading factory and were not something that could be adjusted at the gun. Treatise on Ammunition 1915 makes it quite clear that reduced charges are for practice and not service (operational) use.

Also, not all howitzers used bagged charges. The 4.5 inch was a separate loading QF weapon, hence had a cartridge case. That contained five individual charges that could be adjusted at the gun depending on the fire mission.

By definition in British parlance a Breech Loading gun (or howitzer) uses a bagged charge, so your statement that "some Breech Loading guns still used bagged charges" is incorrect,

Regards

TonyE

[centurion]

I disagree. As far as I am aware,"reduced charges" for guns, whether QF or bagged were made up at the loading factory and were not something that could be adjusted at the gun. Treatise on Ammunition 1915 makes it quite clear that reduced charges are for practice and not service (operational) use.

Also, not all howitzers used bagged charges. The 4.5 inch was a separate loading QF weapon, hence had a cartridge case. That contained five individual charges that could be adjusted at the gun depending on the fire mission.

By definition in British parlance a Breech Loading gun (or howitzer) uses a bagged charge, so your statement that "some Breech Loading guns still used bagged charges" is incorrect,

Regards

TonyE

And Hogg calls those "individual charges" (portions) loaded into the case bagged. The point I was making is that a single fixed charge does not necessarily define a gun as opposed to a howitzer

[SiegeGunner]

Hogg, Allied Artillery of WW1.

I don't have the book, Nigel. Could you please quote the passage in question. Thanks.

[Rayessex]

Incidently there's never been a Rapier compound at Woolwich.

Incidently, Yes there has!!

[nigelfe]

I think you are getting confused with Quick Firing .guns which had a single fixed charge but some Breech Loading guns still used bagged charges and might be used with with a full charge or a reduced charge depending on circumstances. Howitzers capable of higher angled indirect fire used a bagged charge as the size of the charge would affect the trajectory. See the sectioni on ammunition in Allied Artillery of World War one (Hogg) .

I think you're getting confused. The origin of QF was the recoil system that meant that the gun did not move around very much (if at all) when it fired. With this it made sense to maximise the benefits hence use of cart cases, which in turn led to guns being categorised in UK as being QF or BL (offically these terms are no longer in use).

Variable charges have little or nothing to do with 'bagged' charges. All propellant comes in bags unless it is part of a fixed round, the use of cartridge cases simplified the breach mechanism and eliminated the need for the breach to provide obturation, and because the case contained the primer (primer magazines weren't invented until FH70 IIRC), allowed a faster rate of fire that became practical with recoil systems. Variable charges may or may not be in cartridge cases. Similarly, single charge propellant may or may not be cased.

The 4.5-in How used cart cases as did the WW1 designed 3.7. Unlike some nations (notably Austro-Hungary) UK did not use cart cases for large calbre land service Guns or Hows. A 40cm cart case is an impressive piece of brass, visit the Vienna military museum if you've not seen such a thing. Its also worth noting that in WW1 Hows like 4.5 and 6-in could not fire in high angle and 8-in barely made it in later Mks.

You might find this page http://nigelef.tripod.com/gunchars.htm of my web site helpful.

[SiegeGunner]

I don't have the book, Nigel. Could you please quote the passage in question. Thanks.

Waiting with interest, Nigel ...

[nigelfe]

Pg 127

"At the same time as the 18-inch howitzer project was begun, a project for an 18in long-range gun was mooted; work began on this in 1917 but the idea was dropped early in 1918. Three guns were eventually made, but by that time the project had been passed to the Royal Navy and the three weapons ended up arming three monitors of the General Wolfe class. There was discussion, in 1918, of developing a 20in (508mm) naval gun and, inevitably, somebody suggested a railway mounting for this,"

Have you heard about inter-library loans? It's not a modern innovation.

[SiegeGunner]

Many thanks, Nigel. I can do better than borrow the book .... I shall buy it in the New Year, if I can find a copy. From 'a project for an 18-in long-range gun was mooted', I surmise that the suggestion probably came from Elswick, seeing an opportunity to scale up the BL 15" and make double use of the tooling and handling equipment being installed for the 18" howitzer.

[MikB]

At nearly 35 calibres long, with an MV of 1880 fps, and no obvious capability of upper or near-upper-register fire (certainly not from the proof carriage !), I think calling this thing a howitzer was rather exploitative of the elasticity of the term. I'd say it's a sort of 'almost gun' or 'gun/howitzer'. In a sense it falls between two stools, without the longer reach of a gun of this size, but with a trajectory a bit flat for proper plunging howitzer work. That would narrow its envelope of useful ranges and might make it hard to find worthwhile employment for it, especially towards the end when fronts became more fluid.

I wonder if that's why the project wasn't pursued?

Regards,

MikB

[nigelfe]

The MV was significantly lower than 14 and 12 in guns. The capability for upper register (ie high angle) fire was not an essential one for defining a How at that time. High angle is not essential for 'plunging fire', you get a steep angle of descent from any gun at around the last 10-15% of its range, maybe a bit more. The more charges you have the better the overlap, high angle also improves this coverage but is not essential. Where high really helps is at short ranges. Not forgetting that plunging fire is only useful if there are fairly steep sided hils around with targets tucked in ebhind them. What 18-in was about was a lot of 'bang', ie destructive power.

Don't forget the Gun & How pairing, 14-in G gave the long range, 18-in H gave the firepower.