You guys have never failed me before so I’m coming to you again for help.
There is a light field artillery piece in front of a house that I pass every day (it’s on a busy highway). I don’t have a picture of it and would find it difficult to get one and even more difficult to post it once I got one. Anyway, This little gun is a breech loader, is mounted high on its carriage and seems to fairly small in caliber. It has a slim barrel and looks fairly modern. I am thinking 50mm or less (closer to 37mm I’d say in guestimation). The carriage wheels are big, wooden spoked jobs and the carriage itself seems to be wooden, too. I am guessing this thing is from the Spanish American War or WW I. I have looked pretty much everywhere online and can’t find anything to compare it to. HeavyArty, got any ideas? Please save me from getting eaten up by this homeowner’s dogs.I live in southern Virginia (Suffolk) and have seen a lot of old field pieces on display but this one is unique. Thanks in advance!
I had thought about that, but with the large military population and installations around here, and the history of this area, I think it is a legitimate piece of artillery.
Without a pic, it is really hard to tell. Standard US howitzer in WW1 was the Schneider French 75mm Howitzer. It had wooden wagon wheels, later pneumatic tires, on a high mounted carriage. Looks like this.
Could be a combo of an early carraige and a later gun. 37mm wasn’t really widely used till after WW1, as an AT gun. No real need before that since tanks weren’t around till 1914.
The army had a couple of “pack” guns during the period before WWI. It might be older - the small breech-loaders from the Civil War period were real small. What kind of breech is it (Sliding block or screw?) If it is a French 75 the recoil rollers under the muzzle ar a give away. It might also be a British 18 pounder. (I think there was an earlier 13 pounder as well) Does it have a gun shield? Here are some links http://www.defence.gov.au/ARMY/7fdbty/ history.htm http://www.spanamwar.com/hotchkiss165.JPGhttp://www.spanamwar.com/hotchkiss3inch.JPG
I’m going to drive by it as slow as the traffic will let me, it’s in this guy’s yard and up on a little rise. There sren’t any recoil rollers and no splinter shield. It seems like an odd duck, like that stuff between the Civil War and WW I. Thanks for your help, I’ll try to get some better info
Not correct. It is considered the first Field Artillery piece that could engage targets beyong the horizon. Before it, you had to see your target to hit it. The Schneider gun was the first to have artillery tables for engaging targets with a ballistic trajectory.
The breech is a sliding block, and did I mention the dogs in the yard?? Really though, I’ve been meaning to stop by and ask but I leave for work at O-dark-thirty and the after work beer is calling too loudly to me at quitting time for me to stop anywhere. I’ll try to stop by on a weekend and talk to the property owner if we can’t figure it out ourselves.
Interesting. Your description sounds like the piece on display in front of our county courthouse. I always thought it was a 3" field gun from either the Spanish-American War or WWI. If I remember it I’ll see if there is any identifying tag on it.
“Not correct. It is considered the first Field Artillery piece that could engage targets beyong the horizon. Before it, you had to see your target to hit it. The Schneider gun was the first to have artillery tables for engaging targets with a ballistic trajectory.”
It appears you don’t know, or choose to ignore the basic distinctions between a field gun (flat trajectory), and a howitzer. The only thing the Mle 1897 is considered “first” for is it’s cradle with a long recoil recouperator.
Indirect fire had been known, and practiced for some time before the Mle 1897 came into service.
Indeed, one can site numerous combat exampes of this artillery practice. Here are just two; Most recently before the Great War, the Russians used the principle against the Turks in their 1877 war, and the practice was repeated by the Bulgarians in the siege of Andriannople in the First Balkan War. Among the pieces used in the later action was the Krupp C73 QL field gun; a weapon that preceeded the Mle 1897 by a few decades.
With all due respect, who on earth told you indirect fire was an innovation of the Mle 1897 ?
Sorry to ruffle your feathers, but it was the first piece used by the US Army as an indirect fire weapon and considered the first US Field Artillery piece. The distictions between a Gun and a Howitzer has been debated for years and in the eyes of the Field Artillery, it was a Howitzer, not a gun. We see a gun as an AT piece. Call it what you want, it was a great innovation and a great piece of equipment that modernized the Field Artillery.
… It’s difficult to continue this discussion without appearing condenscending. The differences between a howitzer lobbing it’s round in a high arc, and a flat trajectory gun projectile is uttlery elementary. I am having trouble deciding if you’re trying to inject humor, or have made a determined effort to not know the difference. Below are my final entries on the subject.
You have made 3 assumptions; all of them flawed:
The US Army refered to the Mle 75 as a howitzer - I have both the US manual of 1918 : "75mm Field Gun Model of 1897( French ), and the French manual for the same gun: “75 Mle 1897”. In niether publication does the word “howitzer” appear (it would be “Obusier” in French).
The Mle 1897 is considered the first US field artillery piece- Actually, the first modern (utilizing a cradle recoil absorbtion, and return to battery mechanision) US piece was the 3 inch Gun Model 1902; more than a hundred served with the army, seeing combat against the Mexicans 1in 1916. It was to be replaced by the 3 inch M1916. Additionally, there was the 4.7 inch M1906 which was a very good gun. After America’s entry in the war, the AEF was largely armed with French artillery. Hence, the Mle 1897, 155mm GPF, and 155mm Schneider howitzer where standardized in the US army post war.
The distinctions between a gun and howitzer have been debated for years- I cerntainly don’t know between whom. In all these years of ordnance study, and research, I’ve yet to meet an artillery historian irrational enough to suggest the Mle 1897 was not a gun, but rather a howitzer !
Hmmm…Interesting ‘discussion’, but a serving artillery officer "irrational’?. I don’t know, maybe I’m biased by my own service, but I ‘ll take the opinion of someone who has thier hand on the hardware over "scholars’ flipping through books any day. My apologies to the armchair historians, but, whether the weapon was used in direct fire or indirect fire, gun or howitzer really isn’t that big of a deal is it? All I know is that when I called in artillery, it was there and went boom, and saved lives on our side, and took them away on the other.
As far as identifying the weapon for modelling purposes, take a picture, and I’ll bet Gino won’t need to dig into a book to identify the piece. Just my opinion, I don’t want to flame the thread. But in the interest of the original context , can we get back to the modelling?
subfixer, if you could get a photo somehow it would be a big help.
In addition I would not argue artillery with a serving artillery officer, I would trust his opinion more than a book, found too many mistakes or authors opinions in books to totally trust them
After a slow pass (45MPH), I noticed that the gun carriage seems to be made steel and is held together with large rivets or round head bolts. The bore is fairly small, around two inches in diameter from what I can see, and the barrel is maybe about four or five feet long and slim, tapering down towards the muzzle.
