@historicalfirearms / www.historicalfirearms.info
On the 16 July, I gave a talk at the UK’s National Army Museum in London. Organised by the Vickers Machine Gun Collection & Research Association the event commemorated the 100th anniversary of the disbandment of the British Army’s Machine Gun Corps but also commemorated the legacy of the Vickers Machine Gun itself. In support of the event I gave a talk on how the Vickers was used in the indirect fire role.
You can watch the talk below:
During the First World War Germany struggled to produce its own tanks, with no more than 20 A7Vs being built, instead the Imperial German Army made liberal use of captured allied tanks.
The British Army's first dedicated infantry anti-tank weapon was a rifle grenade. Rifle grenades became extremely popular during the First World War and when the tank threat emerged a rifle grenade seemed like the ideal answer.
Watch the video below:
Check out the accompanying article for this video at www.armourersbench.com.
Hi guys, here’s a special Halloween episode of our new podcast, Fighting On Film, that looks at classic and obscure war films.
In this episode we discuss Death Trench (also known as Trench 11), a 2017 First World War horror movie set in the final months of the war. A rag tag band of soldiers investigate a German biological weapons bunker with predictable results!
Also available on other platforms and apps - find them here
Be sure to follow us on Twitter @FightingOnFilm and let us know what you thought of the episode and if you’ve seen Death Trench.
Happy Halloween and Thanks for listening!
Thomas Edison, in the New York Times, October 1915.
Unsurprisingly, Edison was an outspoken proponent of using technology in war and following the outbreak of World War One pushed hard for the US to pay more attention to scientific and technological developments.
Edison would eventually be asked to help establish the Naval Consulting Board and become its president. Throughout the war he devoted much of his time and effort towards experimenting and developing technology for the US navy.
The CLB 75 is not what it seems. The photograph above was taken during a California National Guard exercise which was widely publicised but the tank featured at its centre is little more than a tractor encased in stamped sheet metal.
Developed by the C.L. Best Tractor Company of San Francisco, the CLB 75 is based on the chassis of a CLB 75hp 'Tracklayer'/’Autotractor’. It had a sheet metal outer-skin and a rounded turret. It’s an eye-catching design, like something straight out of an H.G.Wells novel.
A C.L. Best Autotractor, the basis of the CLB 75 (source)
The tank has a set of tracks and a front steering wheel. The CLB 75 appears to be bristling with a pair of cannons and at least two machine guns in the turret. The CLB 75 was what is often described as a ‘parade tank’, an impractical tank designed as a showpiece for parades at home rather than in the field on the frontline. Similar parade tanks were built on Holt and Caterpillar tractors. This particular example even features in Pathe newsreel where it’s described as a ‘land dreadnought’ and shown in mock attacks mounted during National Guard exercises.
In reality during the First World War the US developed or produced three actual tanks: the M1917 Light Tank - based on the French Renault FT, the Ford M1918 3-Ton Tank and the MKVIII ‘International’ heavy tank. While none of those saw action during the war they were more practical, actual armoured fighting vehicles than the parade tanks like the CLB 75.
Sources:
Images: 1 2 3
Caterpillar Chronicle : History of the Greatest Earthmovers, E.C. Orlemann
Early US Armor: Tanks 1916–40, S.J. Zaloga
American Tanks In Action 1917, British Pathe, (source)
During World War One massive railway guns were used to reach deep behind enemy lines and attack enemy infrastructure with both sides using the massive artillery pieces. In this Armourer’s Bench video I take a look at some archival footage of America's massive railway guns ranging from 10 to 16 inches.
I found this amazing archival footage while doing some research in the US National Archives’ online catalogue. So thought I’d put together this short video showcasing some of these massive guns in action.
Thanks for watching guys, I hope you find these huge guns as interesting as I do!
I came across a pair of sketches of US tanks and infantry in action by Captain George Harding. George Matthews Harding was a painter and illustrator who acted as an official US war artist during World War One. Harding had previously been a writer and illustrator with The Saturday Evening Post and Harper's Monthly.
The first sketch depicts a platoon of FT light tanks, armed with Hotchkiss machine guns, advancing near between Avocourt and Montfaucon, during the Battle of St. Mihiel. The sketch was submitted in September 1918, while the second shows troops following up another FT, armed with a 37mm cannon, during an attack near Esseu. The second sketch is undated.
The sketches are beautifully dynamic with crisp, accurate, detail in the foreground and an ethereal conveyance of the atmosphere of battle in the background. Harding was one of eight war artists sent with the American Expeditionary Force. During World War Two, he commissioned with the USMC and again acted as a war artist. He died in 1959, aged 77.
Sources:
Images: 1 2
The American Expeditionary Forces In Action: Drawings of Capt. George Harding V.S.R. Official Artist A.E.F., H.M Harding (1920) (source)
Hey guys, here's this week's Armourer’s Bench video!
Last week while doing some research with the US National Archive’s online catalogue I came across some amazing contemporary footage of the Ford M1918 and I decided to put this short documentary together. In the video I talk about the development, history and fate of America's first tank.
The 3-Ton Ford M1918 Light Tank was the first tank to be entirely designed and built by the United States. A light and nimble armoured vehicle armed with a 30 calibre machine gun and powered by a pair of Ford Model T engines!
Only 15 of an order for 15,000 Ford Light Tanks were built (and half of them are seen in the video above!) before the end of the war. Check out my accompanying blog for more info & photographs here.
I hope you guys like tanks as much as I do, thanks for watching! - Matt
While the Imperial German Army’s T-Gewehr is relatively well know, it’s short-lived British counterpart is almost unknown. The Godsal Anti-Tank rifle, developed in 1918, represents an answer to a problem Britain did not yet face.
The name Philip Thomas Godsal is more frequently associated with another unusual firearm - the Godsal bullpup rifle developed in the early 1900s. Major Godsal was a British army officer, who joined the 52nd Light Infantry in 1869, eventually leaving the army in 1880. He became a well-known and respected rifle marksman winning a number of prestigious shooting competitions.
By 1918, it appears that working with Webley & Scott, who had also built his earlier bullpup prototypes, Godsal developed a bolt action rifle chambered in a large .5 inch calibre, perhaps as a response to the German T-Gewehr. At the time the rifle was being developed Godsal would have been around 68. It is unclear if the development of the rifle was a project requested or sanctioned by the British government or if it was a private commercial venture to be offered to the military when complete.
This rifle in particular is marked ‘1′ on its receiver and proof marked near its trunion with ‘.600/ 500′ referring to the British .600/500in round used in the early .5-inch aircraft Vickers machine guns before the switch to 12.7x81mm. The version of the round used with the Godsal used a bullet with a soft lead core.
The action seen in the photographs of the rifle held by the Royal Armouries’ collection bears a strong resemblance to an action patented by Godsal, in the US and UK, in 1914. It would seem that Godsal was able to scale up this action for use in a rifle chambered in a much larger cartridge.
Godsal’s 1914 action patent (source)
The action appears to be a development of the one developed for use with his earlier bullpup rifles. In the anti-tank rifle the pistol grip and trigger have been moved back to a more conventional position and the anti tank rifle does not have a magazine and is likely a single shot weapon, much like its German counterpart. The prototype has a rather thin looking pistol grip made from a machined metal piece that extends from beneath the action, making up the the trigger guard and then projecting back down the wrist of the stock. This was no doubt to strengthen the wooden stock. The pistol grip itself has wooden panels held in place by a pair of screws. The buttstock looks to have a half inch thick butt pad, possible made from rubber, to aid with recoil.
The rifle’s sights are marked from 2 to 20, probably indicating a graduated range of up to 2,000 yards. The weapon has an exposed, dovetailed front sight. Interestingly, the early .55 Boys Anti-Tank rifles, developed in the 1930s and eventually adopted by the British Army, had an almost identical muzzlebreak to the Godsal rifle.
The prototype appears to have a very large extractor on top of the bolt, held in place in a dovetail. Simpler but somewhat similar to that seen in the 1914 patent. Additionally corresponding to the patent is the location of what looks to be a safety catch on the right, top, side of the receiver. There are also signs that changes have been made to the prototype during development such as a scallop cut in the stock and receiver on the left, an exposed, empty slot and a number of holes drilled into the receiver. There is no sign of any wooden handguards being attached to the rifle and it likely used a bipod or a rest for testing.
Overhead view of the Godal’s action (source)
It is likely that development of Godsal’s came to a halt when the First World War ended. With little money available for military research and development and no urgent need for an anti-tank rifle the project was probably shelved in early 1919. Godsal’s anti-tank rifle certainly intriguing and deserves to have its story investigated further. Godsal died in 1925, aged 75.
Godsal’s gun is a contemporary of another lesser known First World War anti-tank rifle, the Experimental 1918 Winchester .50 Calibre Anti-Tank Rifle developed by Edwin Pugsley.
Sources:
‘Centrefire bolt-action anti-tank rifle - Godsal (about 1918)’, Royal Armouries, (source)
‘Small-Arm’ P.T. Godsal, US Patent #1139268, 31/12/1914, (source)
‘British Small Arms Development: The Interwar Years’, Historical Breechloading Smallarms Association, T. Edwards, (source)
The Anti-Tank Rifle, S.J. Zaloga, (2018)
‘.55 inch Boys‘, British Military Small Arms Ammo, (source)
Introduced in early 1917, the Newton 6-inch Mortar replaced the earlier British 2-inch ‘toffee apple’ Trench Mortar. It fired a 52lb or 24kg high explosive shell. It was used by both the British Empire and the US.
Like the 2-inch Trench Mortar it replaced the Newton was manned by men of the Royal Field Artillery and formed part of a divisions artillery. They were deployed close to the frontline and were often used to support attacks or destroy enemy wire.
Canadian troops operating a Newton 6-inch Mortar, c. Nov 1918 (source)
The mortar was designed by Captain H. Newton in 1916, and was produced in both Britain and the US. Over 2,500 were produced before the end of the war. It had an effective range of up to 1,400 yards and a well trained crew could fire up to 8 rounds per minute.
The bomb used Amatol, Ammonal or Sabulite explosive and was detonated, not by an ignition system like the 2-inch mortar, but by a blank .303 cartridge included in the base of the mortar bomb. It was propelled by a variable cordite charge. After the war the Newton was subsequently declared obsolete with the lighter Stokes 3-inch mortar remaining in service during the inter-war period.
Sources:
Images: 1 2
I recently had the chance to co co-wrote an with researcher Andrew Stolinski of the Archival Research Group. We traced the history of the first Springfield M1903 (serial number #1) ever built. Normally the first of a new rifle made would have spent its life in a museum but it somehow M1903 #1 was different.
Somehow it made it into the hands of a US soldier who took it all the way to France in 1918! In the article we follow the rifle’s journey using documentary sources including enrollment documents, morning reports, shipping manifests and Ordnance Department memos.
It's a truly fascinating, nuanced story!
As news of the signing of the Armistice broke crowds spontaneously took to the streets of towns and cities all around the world to celebrate. Above are photos of celebrating crowds in Paris, New York, London and Buenos Aires.
Here’s some footage of crowds celebrating and marching around London on the day of the Armistice:
For most people back home, regardless of country, it was the front pages of the local newspaper that announced the end of the war. Above are a collection of 10 newspapers from around the world: Britain, America, France, Canada, Ireland and Germany. These pages heralded the end of over four years of bloody conflict that saw tens of millions die and the world changed forever.
At the beginning of my WWI100 project I posted a similar collection of front pages that announced the beginning of the war, you can find that here.
Image Sources:
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6 7 8 9 10
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.
Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.
Written by Canadian army doctor Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae, after the death of a friend in May 1915. McCrae didn’t survive the war, he died of pneumonia in January 1918.
Cecil Lewis, an ace pilot with the Royal Flying Corps and Military Cross recipient, on the unexpected cost of war for young men who fought, survived and returned home to find their prospects less than promising.
Sagittarius Rising, C. Lewis (1936)
The Entente delegation led by France's Marshal Ferdinand Foch and Britain's 1st Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Rosslyn Wemyss pose by the train carriage, 2419D, in which the armistice that finally ended the Great War was signed.
The negotiations and eventual signing of the armistice took place in the Forest of Compiègne in the early hours of the morning of the 11th. The German delegation, not pictured, was led by a politician Matthias Erzberger.
The armistice didn't end the war, it merely paused it. It agreed an initial ceasefire between the 11th November to the 13th December 1918. It was subsequently extended several times until a peace agreement was finally signed on the 10th January, 1920.
