Lyddite Shells

[Bucephalus]

So, if only HE lyddite shells remained in turret "A" of HMS Invincible at the end of the Falklands battle, and it was common practice to fire HE common shells at longer ranges, then switch to AP shells at closer ranges, one would assume that Invincible and Inflexible, when they first attempted to engage SMS Scharnhorst and Gneisenau at about 16,000 yards, would have tried common HE shells, then switched to AP rounds when the ranges became more reasonable.

I have to assume that this tactic was employed by HMS Glasgow, Cornwall, and Kent as well (against the German light cruisers), leading me to believe that when they "switched to lyddite" shells later in the battle, it was because they had depleted their stocks of HE common and AP shells (rather than to employ the HE lyddite for a particular tactical purpose). Does that sound reasonable?

Also, I understand that HMS Inflexible, when she and Invincible met with HMS Glasgow at Abrolhos Rocks before heading to the Falklands, had brought with her extra ammunition to replace the shells that Glasgow had used at Coronel. Do we know what kind of ammunition they brought?

Thanks,

Bucephalus

[Sleepy]

An interesting post but have no idea what everyone is talking about, can someone please explain (simply), what is a lyddite shell? what is HE (high explosive?), advantages of either?

Sorry for my ignorance

Sleepy

[ionia]

So, if only HE lyddite shells remained in turret "A" of HMS Invincible at the end of the Falklands battle, and it was common practice to fire HE common shells at longer ranges, then switch to AP shells at closer ranges, one would assume that Invincible and Inflexible, when they first attempted to engage SMS Scharnhorst and Gneisenau at about 16,000 yards, would have tried common HE shells, then switched to AP rounds when the ranges became more reasonable.

I have to assume that this tactic was employed by HMS Glasgow, Cornwall, and Kent as well (against the German light cruisers), leading me to believe that when they "switched to lyddite" shells later in the battle, it was because they had depleted their stocks of HE common and AP shells (rather than to employ the HE lyddite for a particular tactical purpose). Does that sound reasonable?

The only primary source I have seen on actual use of the different shells is that of the Commander of the CORNWALL:

“At 6.15 we started using lyddite instead of common shell, having again decreased the range. The result was stupendous, the dark smoke and flash caused by those projectiles as they struck could be plainly seen, and not long afterwards the enemy was on fire.”

At the time the CORNWALL had been firing at the LEIPZIG since 4.15 and the range was about 8000 yards. It should be remembered that the LEIPZIG was not an armoured ship.

He also comments that the KENT, in her engagement with the NURNBERG, commenced using lyddite when the range had closed to 3000 yards. The NURNBERG was also an unarmoured ship.

[per ardua per mare per terram]

Here are some UKNA files:

ADM 186/566 Action off the Falkland Islands 8 Dec 1914: report of Vice-Admiral Sir F C D Sturdee 1915

ADM 1/8408/6 Methods of firing used by HM Ships INVINCIBLE and INFLEXIBLE during the action off the Falkland Islands 1915

The problems with picric acid shells had been shown up in the Russo-Japanese War, but not fully appreciated - DK Brown, ‘Warrior to Dreadnought’ and the research he drew upon give some background. The Edinburgh trials were written up in the 'Gunnery Manual 1915,' the findings and the deductions from them had not been implemented by Jutland.

[michaeldr]

I think that I must join Sleepy in having to do some catching-up here

I have found that more often than not, the contemporary accounts of naval actions

[eg; those for this particular one are in the May 1915 issue of The Naval Review and on-line]

refer to only two types of shell - Common and Lyddite

or have I missed something again?

an explanation of these two terms is given here

[both quotes below from http://www.navweaps.com]

Lyddite - British Picric Acid, trinitrophenol. Prior to 1908, the British used gunpowder as the burster for both AP and Common shells, but after that date Lyddite came into use for HE projectiles. In 1909, the Royal Navy began experimenting with APC [Armor Piercing Capped] using Lyddite as the burster and began introducing them into service the following year, even though testing had shown that this filling was more sensitive to shock than gunpowder and thus prone to explode prematurely before the shell had a chance to penetrate almost any thickness of armor plate.

Common - Common projectiles were originally shells - which literally means a hollow container - filled with black powder and used for attacking lightly armored or unarmored vessels. By the 1930s, this term was used by a few navies to describe any non-armor piercing shell. By that time, the bursters were less sensitive explosives, such as TNT. In the USN, Common projectiles of the 1920-1950 period did not have caps or hoods and were designed to penetrate approximately one-third of their caliber of armor.

And here are some other examples from TNR referred to earlier

quote: We closed in now to 4,700 yards turning round 16 points to keep out of torpedo range, and gave her a few more salvos of lyddite with our starboard guns as there was not too much time to lose

quote: The officer whom we saved, was the torpedo lieutenant of the Leipzig. He told us that when we started really hitting his ship towards the latter part of the action, we continued to hit at every salvo we fired. He also said that when we started firing our lyddite shell (or our big guns as he honestly seemed to think) the damage was terrific. The loss of life was fearful,

quote: As the bursting qualities of lyddite have been called in question, it may be of interest to remark that the German prisoners were unanimous in stating that they burst efficiently and regularly, creating tremendous havoc.

Does the last remark indicate that AP was being used here?

Thanks to Bucephalus for raising this topic, and to the Pals for any further guidance

regards

Michael

[ionia]

I think that I must join Sleepy in having to do some catching-up here

I have found that more often than not, the contemporary accounts of naval actions

[eg; those for this particular one are in the May 1915 issue of The Naval Review and on-line]

refer to only two types of shell - Common and Lyddite

or have I missed something again?

I think these NR extracts refer to 6" guns rather than the 12" of the INVINCIBLE which were the subject of earlier comments. I do not know that APC was supplied for 6" guns in 1914 - the "Common" possibly refers to CPC (which was almost as effective as the contemporaty APC against armour as it carried a more stable burster) rather than uncapped common shell.

[Bucephalus]

As several of the earlier comments have indicated, it seems that there are several variables that make this a bit difficult to sort out:

1. The vernacular of the time, simply referring to "common" versus "lyddite" shells, when there were apparently at least three major types of shells in use (HE black powder, HE lyddite, and APC lyddite).

2. The possibility that some calibers of guns (particularly the larger 12" guns) did not yet have a full range of lyddite-filled shells available.

3. The possibility that certain firing protocols were in use depending upon the range of engagement - owing to both the tactical realities (will the shells be dropping onto decks and superstructures from longer distances or will they be hitting armor belts from shorter ranges?) plus the real or perceived instability of the lyddite bursters in the shells themselves.

4. The reality that some targets were armored (such as the Scharnhorst and Gneisenau) and some were not (Leipzig and Nurnberg) and one would presume that an attacker might take that into account when firing upon armored versus unarmored targets.

I truly appreciate the scholarly responses to this question. Fascinating stuff.

Thanks,

Bucephalus

[Bob H]

2. How were the shells differentiated? Were they stored in separate areas of the magazines?

I have examined the plans for HMS Agincourt, and in the shell rooms there were several bins labelled with the number & type of shells.

In Shell Room 1 the total was:

104 Shells Common

54 Shells Armour Piercing

20 Shells Shrapnel

Regards

Bob

[Bucephalus]

Interesting, thanks! So presumably the "shrapnel" shells were the HE Lyddite type.

I would assume from all of this information thus far that the Captain and senior gunnery officer would choose the type of shell depending upon the tactical situation and signal the loading and gun crews accordingly - who would then load from the appropriate bins? Any idea how these signals would be passed from the bridge on down to ensure that the right kind of shells got loaded?

Thanks,

Bucephalus