Heavy Artillery Group (RGA) War Diaries - Silencing/Neutralising Enemy Batteries

[RussT]

Recently I've been skimming through numerous RGA Heavy Artillery Group (HAG) aka RGA Brigade War Diaries trying to follow the various movements of certain Heavy Batteries (HB) as they moved from one HAG to another on the Western Front, which was quite often (WO/95/5494 generally lists these movements if anyone is interested).

In the main, these War Diaries make quite dry reading. One general observation I have made is that on almost every page of every diary one HB or another, in undertaking counter-battery fire, is recorded as silencing or neutralising a hostile battery. Yet I have never come across a diary entry that states enemy shelling ever silenced or neutralised their own gun/battery (although that must have clearly happened on occasion).

Is this partly down to simple bias/bravado in recording events to put the HAG in a good light when the diary is passed upwards to the higher command and historically in general?

I'm completely unfamiliar with the operations of the artillery in general and the actions they got up to specifically, so perhaps I am mis-reading the events and/or not quite grasping the bigger picture.

I'll be interested in any views from the experts.

Russ

 

[MrEd]

I spent a bit of time reading various SB and HB diaries about the movements of 251, 252 and 176  SB - enemy action destroying guns, or have the effect of forcing guns to be moved etc is definitely mentioned at the siege battery level, but not so much at the higher levels - I would be interested to know why as well.

 

you are right, on the whole quite dry reading tbh, but with the odd noteworthy sentence or event 

[James A Pratt III]

In the RFC communiques there are many references of RFC aircraft spotting for Siege batteries shelling German gun positions ect.. I have mentioned them in posts about men in siege batteries

[RussT]

8 minutes ago, James A Pratt III said:

In the RFC communiques there are many references of RFC aircraft spotting for Siege batteries shelling German gun positions

Yes you come across fairly frequently in the WDs remarks relating to the RFC spotting for the guns.

Russ

 

[charlie962]

8 hours ago, RussT said:

silencing or neutralising a hostile battery.

 Measurement of our success in counter battery fire could only be quantified by level of suppression of enemy fire without knowing actual damage done to guns. 

I'm surprised to hear it was not often reported at higher levels if our own guns were prevented from firing due to enemy counterbattery operations. The Infantry would certainly want to know why they didn't get the support planned ! 

 

Counterbattery fire was surely as effectively carried out by the Germans as the Allies ?

[charlie962]

I thought there was detail in the daily reports at Commander Heavy Artillery level? There were particular refs to counterbattery, both ours and theirs.

 Been a while since I looked at them though ..

[RussT]

45 minutes ago, charlie962 said:

Measurement of our success in counter battery fire could only be quantified by level of suppression of enemy fire without knowing actual damage done to guns. 

The "measurement/quantification" seems to be simply what the War Diarist reported for that day - i.e. "the hostile battery was silenced or neutralised". Perhaps it was indeed silenced/neutralised - there just seems be a huge difference between the number of reports of us silencing/neutralising their guns/batteries compared to them silencing/neutralising ours.

50 minutes ago, charlie962 said:

Counterbattery fire was surely as effectively carried out by the Germans as the Allies ?

That would be my expectation (and was, I believe, the actual reality) - yet you would not think so from the War Diaries it seems.

44 minutes ago, charlie962 said:

I thought there was detail in the daily reports at Commander Heavy Artillery level?

Every time I am able to work out to which Corps a given HAG belonged (far easier said than done - unless you know different), then I also look at the Commander Heavy Artillery War Diary - but I can't say that I have come across much/any commentary on this aspect being remarked upon. Perhaps the Commanders gathered the information from different sources, not the War Diaries - which I don't think were reporting systematically and frequently enough for the purposes of "measurement/quantification" - as you put it.

Russ

 

[charlie962]

4 minutes ago, RussT said:

which I don't think were reporting systematically and frequently enough

I thought there were daily (intelligence?) summaries but I confess to poor memory.

Sorry of I've not helped but I am interested to see replies 

Charlie

[RussT]

8 minutes ago, charlie962 said:

I thought there were daily (intelligence?) summaries but I confess to poor memory.

That might well have been the case or at least something akin to those I'm sure.

But I am looking at War Diaries (I don't think there is really anything else I can use) - which were supposedly written up in compliance with some general guidance. One key reason for their compilation was the ability to construct an account/history of the unit/formation post war. The "quality" varies enormously between diaries (not just RGA diaries) and of course the Diarist's eye must have been on their future scrutiny. They were also sent forward on a monthly basis - so would be completely hopeless I assume for operational purposes.

It's a bit like when you read any infantry unit's War Diary - every failed attack seems to the fault of the unit on it's right (or left) leaving its flank in the air.

Russ

[ianjonesncl]

A thought.... 

The result of a Fire Mission is, without specific intelligence, an assessment as to the effect of the artillery fire eg silenced / neutralised.

The report on the battery position is the consequence of enemy counter battery fire and a statement of facts, eg 2 guns damaged.

 

15 hours ago, charlie962 said:

Measurement of our success in counter battery fire could only be quantified by level of suppression of enemy fire without knowing actual damage done to guns. 

From a counter battery perspective the initial assessment is that the battery has been silenced / neutralised. This may be due to;

Counter Battery fire has caused the enemy guns to stop firing in order to stop the counter battery fires. In this case the enemy battery may still be a threat when firing from that location. The target location is known.

Counter Battery fire has caused the enemy guns to move. In this case the enemy battery may still be threat when relocated. The target location is unknown.

Counter Battery fire has damaged / destroyed guns consequently the threat from that location and any other potential location has been eliminated. 

To make an more informed decision as the effect of the counter battery fires requires, what is termed modern artillery parlance, Battlefield Damage Assessment (BDA). In World One I would suggest that given the position of enemy gun batteries out of sight, would be one of the functions of RFC units assigned to the Gunners. They may be able to assess the damage, but unless a gun could actually be obviously damaged, I think it would be difficult. 

15 hours ago, charlie962 said:

I'm surprised to hear it was not often reported at higher levels if our own guns were prevented from firing due to enemy counterbattery operations. The Infantry would certainly want to know why they didn't get the support planned ! 

 

Always wary of applying modern artillery practices to situations WW1, however I believe it would have been a higher headquarters who would make the assessment as to whether a battery had been silenced / neutralised by enemy counter battery fires by ordering them to stop firing or move. 

The higher headquarters makes the assessment as to whether the guns are to stop firing or move and be able to fight another day. Or they are to remain firing in order to support the infantry as that operation was the critical factor in an overall plan.

[PRC]

A couple of weeks ago we had a thread trying to identify the unit in a photograph, which turn out to be a Kite Balloon Training Depot in the UK. The commanding officer was identified via references to him in "Memoirs of an old balloonatic" by Goderic Hodges, which can be freely borrowed from archive org. https://archive.org/details/memoirsofoldball0000hodg/page/n1/mode/2up

It's a bit tangental to the thread, but the author has a lot of stories to tell about spotting for counter-battery work around the Ypres salient, and how the Germans obsevers in balloons mainly did their spotting in the morning, (with the sun behind them) and the British in the afternoon and early evening, (ditto), the close ties with the gunners, (mainly the larger guns as the field artillery tended to produce less shell-burst and had a shorter flight time and so were a greater strain to spot for and correct. He speaks of as the observer becoming more experienced and could judge the time of flight by distance between gun and target so that he gradually moved from training his binoculars on the target for the whole flight from giving the command to fire to just the last few seconds. The reduced eye strain allowed him to stay up longer,) and how the telephone communication gave them the advantage over the fixed wing aircraft, which seemed to have been used in this context for confirmation of the outcome rather than identification and co-ordination.

How true this was of the wider conflict I don't know, but puts a different perspective on things.

Cheers,
Peter

[AOK4]

Wouldn't it have been very difficult for the Germans to reach the British counterbattery guns (and the other way around) as these counterbattery guns were usually of a larger calibre and had longer reach, meaning they were far behind the lines?

This is just the first idea that comes to my mind.

[ianjonesncl]

10 minutes ago, PRC said:

He speaks of as the observer becoming more experienced and could judge the time of flight by distance between gun and target so that he gradually moved from training his binoculars on the target for the whole flight from giving the command to fire to just the last few seconds.

Became the "Splash Drill".  Look in 5 seconds before the round landed. 

[ianjonesncl]

This is an interesting account of RFC Counter Battery Operations

Counter Battery Patrols and Zone Calls - Greg's War (gregswar.com)

[RussT]

2 hours ago, AOK4 said:

Wouldn't it have been very difficult for the Germans to reach the British counterbattery guns (and the other way around) as these counterbattery guns were usually of a larger calibre and had longer reach, meaning they were far behind the lines?

Interesting - that is the first suggestion that might offer a credible explanation for the query I posted.

I would be interested to learn whether this was actually the case. I am aware that RGA guns/batteries were sometimes destroyed by enemy HE shellfire and plenty of RGA gunners were wounded, DoW or KiA as a consequence no doubt of counterbattery fire. I assume this was because the Germans did at least have some heavy guns with sufficient calibre/range and/or those guns that were destroyed just happened to be nearer the front (i.e. closer to the German guns) than most others.

Regards

Russ