Non-standard, substitute standard, and captured weapons in British and Commonwealth service

Discussion in 'Weapons, Technology & Equipment' started by TTH, Mar 16, 2012.

  1. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    The 7.92mm MG08 Maxim system guns were the standard German machine guns of the First World War, and the Allies captured many of them--so many, indeed, that during that war the British thought it worthwhile to convert some to take .303 ammunition. The MG08 conversion was also adapted to fit on the Vickers tripod. (Apparently ANYTHING can fit, or be made to fit, on the Vickers tripod.) The IWM is skeptical about the numbers and British service use of these guns, but TonyE here says definitely that the .303 MG08's were indeed issued.
    MG42.US • View topic - British capture mg08's
    MG 08 & Maxim "G" .303 inch Pattern "C" | Imperial War Museums
    Another Bullet Head - Great War Forum

    After 1918, lots of captured MG08's and MG08/15's in 7.92mm found their way postwar to museums, memorials, and veterans' halls in Britain and the Dominions. Then came WWII, and in Australia at least the government got as many of these trophies as they could and also converted them to .303, much as the British had 25 years before. Over 1400 were converted, and they were issued to the Volunteer Defence Corps (Australian home guard). Apparently the New Zealanders had some of these conversions as well.
    [FONT=&quot]RELAWM30192.001 - Maxim MG08/15 Light Machine Gun converted to .303 calibre | Australian War Memorial[/FONT]
    062992 | Australian War Memorial

    I don't know if the Australians got any info about the old WWI conversions from the British. As you can see in the second AWM picture, the MG08 in question is mounted not on a Vickers tripod but on the original (and brutally heavy) German sledge mount.
     
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  2. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    Tank and Aircraft Machineguns in Ground Roles

    The British forces relied almost exclusively on two well-known MG's, the Vickers medium and the Bren LMG. The Vickers also armed most British armored vehicles between the wars. The .303 tank versions used in the early years of WWII were the Mk VI, VI*, and VII, the last being far the most common. There was also a vehicular .50 Vickers (Mk V ) as well. These Vickers guns were gradually replaced in 1939-41 by the 7.92mm and 15mm Besa guns.

    On occasion, tank crews might have to dismount their MGs for local defense. American tanks carried tripods for their .30-06 M1919A4 and .50 M2HB machineguns, but the British preferred to issue Brens for this purpose instead. These Brens were also mounted on tank turrets for AA use, though the Lakeman mounting for them was unpopular.

    Before the advent of the Bren, though, the British had some emergency ground mountings for the Vickers AFV MGs. The preferred type consisted of a short padded butt (MG Shoulder Piece Mk IV) and a silly little bipod (Field Mount Mk I) that clipped around the gun’s water jacket, thus converting it into a very heavy and awkward “light” machine gun. It’s hard for me to see how these mounts could have been any use at all. I have seen pictures of them in Gander’s Machine Guns (Arco Facts on File series) and Dolf Goldsmith’s book about the Vickers, but I have never seen a picture of a gun so adapted in actual use. A proper tripod would have been a much better solution. An Adapter, Vickers MG, Mk I, was made and issued so that the tank Vickers could fit on a standard Vickers tripod (Goldsmith has some pictures, if I recall). However, this adaptor was supposedly for “instructional training purposes only.” For the Vickers tank MGs and the silly bipod mounts, see The Vickers Machine Gun


    The 7.92mm Besa was a modification of the Czech ZB37, a belt-fed ground gun. The ZB had a rather complicated tripod, which the British apparently passed on when they decided to confine the Besa to the AFV role. Yet the Besa occasionally appeared in other roles too. Gander’s book has a picture of one on an improvised AA pole mount. The 9th Australian Division used some Besas as ground guns at Second Alamein. I’ve found no information on how the Australians mounted them, but I would suspect they somehow rigged them to the ever-adaptable Vickers tripod.

    The British had a firepower gap between the Bren and the Vickers. The former was light enough to move with the riflemen, but it couldn’t lay down fire like the German MGs. The Vickers could spit bullets, but it was too heavy for easy movement. A true GPMG was the answer, but failing that the British might have taken a leaf from the American book and found a “light medium” along the lines of the M1919A4. The British had a potential answer in the Browning Mk II, which they were making as an aircraft gun. The Mk II had a high rate of fire, like all aircraft guns, but you’d think the factories could have modified that relatively easily. An official spade grip was available for the gun already. .303 Browning

    The high ROF did not prevent some British units from pressing scrounged .303 Brownings into ground service. The LRDG put .303 Brownings on their vehicles, along with some of the heavier AN-M2 .50 Browning aircraft guns. LRDG Weapons- Machine Guns

    The cover photograph to the recent edition of Louis Allen’s Burma: the Longest War is an excellent color study of Indian troops in action on Pagoda Hill in Mandalay. They are using a pair of Mk II Brownings, mounted on low tripods that appear to be jury-rigged from brackets of some kind. http://www.abfar.co.uk/_images/41044.jpg
     
  3. Gebirgsjaeger

    Gebirgsjaeger Senior Member

    Very interesting Thread! I was always wondering why the British and the US Army used the watercooled MG´s during WW2. Their rate of fire was high and good enough to fulfill their duties with out using a wheelbarrow for the ammo. But they were so bulky and heavy that you weren´t able to change your position quickly. A very good one was the Bren. This one was good and handy enough to be used as a ideal MG for urban warfar and as the MKIII for jungle warfar. But why they haven´t used more air-cooled and beltfed ones?
     
  4. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    Ulrich:

    Hindsight is 20-20, and we must remember that in 1939 the GPMG concept was very innovative and untried. Yes, the Browning M1917A1 and the Vickers were heavy, but they could move with the infantry on foot to some extent and with jeeps and tracked carriers available they could move even faster. Moreover, the water-cooled guns had proven their worth time and again in WWI and subsequent conflicts. Thousands had been made, and with equipment of all kinds in short supply in 1939 it simply would not have made sense for the British and Americans to scrap them in favor of unproven weapons. They were stable on their heavy mounts and quite accurate. Given adequate supplies of water and ammo they could fire all day, and they were ideal for the barrage fire techniques developed in WWI. As far as performance goes, they performed well in WWII also; ask any British soldier what he thought of the Vickers and he will praise it to the skies. The Vickers often bested the MG34 and MG42.

    Yes, the Bren was an excellent conventional LMG, arguably the best ever made, but there was still a gap between the Bren and the Vickers in the British armory. This was made worse by the relative scarcity of the Vickers, with only 36 or 48 in the MG battalions of a standard British division. The Americans had some halfway solutions in the lighter M1919A4 and M1919A6, but the British did not.

    The Germans had used the MG08 in WWI, but under Versailles they were not allowed to make any after 1918. This virtually forced them to come up with something new. In terms of the development of equipment, disarmament was almost an advantage for the Germans...but of course they LOST even with the 34 and 42.
     
  5. Gebirgsjaeger

    Gebirgsjaeger Senior Member

    There is no doubt about the value of the Vickers and Brownings! They ´ve been very good weapons indeed. And they had all the advantages and disadvantages a air cooled MG had to fight with too. Not technically the same but in sense of.
    The German MG42 was indeed a impressive MG, but for the immense need of ammo and the reason that you´ve need often to change the barrels it had its disadvantages too. And the more while you´re running out of supply.
    The gap between those HMG´s and the LMG´s was there, but with a close to extensive use ( a bit of a hard word) of the Bren´s, it seems to equal all.
     
  6. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    The defense of the North American coast in WWII was a collaborative enterprise between the US and Canadian armies. The Canadians were short of weapons of all kinds, and of coast artillery in particular. Even before Pearl Harbor, the Americans provided a number of obsolescent guns to the Canadians, and more were allotted after December 7th. The most important pieces were heavy 10-inch M1900 and 8-inch M1888 coastal guns on railway mountings, but the Canadians also received 155mm M1917/18 heavy field guns (GPF), 155mm M1917/18 medium field howitzers, 75mm field guns (presumably M1897 and/or M1917), 4-inch and 3-pounder naval guns (models not specified), 3-inch M3 and 90mm M1 anti-aircraft guns, and 37mm M3 antitank and M1916 infantry guns (French tireur rapide). Much ordnance also went to Newfoundland. I am still researching this, and will note additional information and types as I proceed.

    [FONT=&quot]8" railway artillery US - Tanknet
    [/FONT]HyperWar: US Army in WWII: Military Relations Between the U.S. and Canada, 1939-1945 [Chapter 4]
    HyperWar: US Army in WWII: Military Relations Between the U.S. and Canada, 1939-1945 [Chapter 7]

    Late note: I suspect that the 4-inch guns were the US Navy's 50-caliber Mark IX. 4"/50 caliber gun - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
     
  7. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    I have just discovered an excellent site relating to my previous post:
    North American Forts - Canada

    Scanning through it, I note the deployment of fairly large numbers of 75mm field pieces in the coastal role. Also, some of the 10-inch and 8-inch guns acquired from the US were mounted in static positions rather than on rails.
    Thus, some 10-inch guns were installed at St. John's, Newfoundland, on M1894M1 disappearing carriages, while other 10-inch installed at Wiseman's Point at Laurenceton were on M1893 barbette mounts. An 8-inch M1888 at St. John's was placed on an M1918 barbette mount. The 155mm GPF M1917/18 guns were sometimes deployed in the coastal role on "Panama" mounts. The 10-inch guns referred to here and in the previous post were apparently M1888 guns, not M1900's as I first supposed, and I have not seen any reference to their use on rail carriages at all.
     
  8. spider

    spider Very Senior Member

  9. Tom Canning

    Tom Canning WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    TTH

    Try the article on "Two Great Men " below in my BBC war series articles - when we used a Panther against it's makers

    Cheers
     
  10. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

  11. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    Spider:

    I think the LMG there is a Bren. If you are referring to the rifleman in the center of the picture his weapon does seem a little slender for an SMLE, at least from this angle. It's not long enough for a standard Arisaka, though.
     
  12. Wills

    Wills Very Senior Member

  13. BrianM59

    BrianM59 Senior Member

    I'm working on some material about an action fought at St.Pierre du Vauvray in June 1940, bu the 10th Hussars. The 2/6th Duke of Wellington’s war diary - they had a company in the village records that . “A British armoured detachment, consisting of one tank and two dismounted machine guns, appeared at Pont du Vouvray bridgehead from out of the blue. The machine-guns were giving covering fire positions on the south side of the bridge, and added substantially to the strength of the defence.”

    I'm trying to find out what 'dismounted machine guns' they might have been using? As far as I can ascertain, the Hussars were equipped with Light Tanks MkVI and A13 Cruiser tanks, the armament for which apart from 2pdrs, was Vickers .303 (in all tanks) and BESA 15mm (in Vickers VIC) and Vickers 0.5 in and Besa 7.92mm (in Vickers VIB ). Given that the war diary - and veterans' accounts - record the Vickers were sent without water pumps and seized after several hundred rounds, I'm trying to find out what these guns might have been. I'm not an expert but I imagine these guns would be difficult enough to remove - but mounting? On what? I take it even dismounted armoured units didn't carry infantry machine gun mounts as standard. Anyone have any ideas/evidence about dismounted tank machine guns being used?


    Mods please feel free to move if this doesn't fit.
     
  14. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    I don't know about the Besa. The Besa 7.92 was used sometimes in the ground role; the 9th Australian Div had some at Alamein. Judging from a drawing I saw online, these were probably mounted on the Vickers infantry tripod. I would think the 15mm was too damned big and heavy to be dismounted.

    As for the Vickers .303 tank guns, special mounts were made so that vehicle crews could use them in the ground role. The most common was a silly little bipod (inaccurately called 'Monopod Mk I') with a bracket that clamped around the water jacket. Sometimes a shoulder pad was added. The .303 and .5 Vickers tank guns could also fit on Vickers infantry tripods, with the help of special adapters. This arrangement was supposed to be for training only, which mystifies me because it seems so much better than the bipod. You can find more at The Vickers Machine Gun

    I have no idea how common issue of these ground mounts and adapters really was. Of course, it is barely possible that the guns your source refers to were Brens. As I recall, some Mk VIs at least were fitted with AA mountings for Bren guns.

    PS: The Vickers infantry tripod was amazingly adaptable. I have seen a very wide range of guns mounted on it, including MG08's, Browning M1919A4, etc.
     
  15. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

    Also, on tank armament: MK VIB had 1 x .5 Vickers, 1 x .303 Vickers. Mk VIC had 1 x 15mm Besa, 1 x 7.92mm. The secondary armament of the A13 varied according to the subtype. Early tanks had the .303 Vickers, later ones had the 7.92 Besa. I have seen a picture of an A13 at Abbeville, and it has the Besa rather than the Vickers. (All this from Chamberlain and Ellis.)
     
  16. TTH

    TTH Senior Member

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  17. BrianM59

    BrianM59 Senior Member

    Thanks TTH for that very prompt reply - you can probably tell by my prompt reply that I'm trying to avoid writing! My own thoughts are with the Vickers - the Hussars had surrendered most or all of their tanks to the Composite Regiment some weeks before and were almost entirely dismounted - a troop of men was sent to defend the banks of the Seine at St.Pierre du Vauvray (about 30/40 men) but none of the Hussars accounts mention machine guns - apart from a few Brens -nor a tank - one section didn't even have enough rifles for the men and they used their .38 revolvers.

    I'm assuming they had enough gear to take a couple of Vickers and scratched together water pumps/mounts from wherever they could - they were out of action for a couple of weeks after Huppy on the 27th and billeted near Rouen at a chateau where they re-equipped as dismounted and practiced with weapons, so it's presumably not beyond the bounds of possibility that they got something working. Like you, I didn't think the possibility of mounting a Besa - either 7.92 or 15mm - was likely. I believe the 15mm was accurate with single shot but whipped so much it was useless with a belt?

    I'll have a look at the Vickers web site for the mounts - thanks again.
     
  18. BrianM59

    BrianM59 Senior Member

    And mea culpa for not doing a detailed enough search or I'd have found your post referred to in 116 - thanks again.
     
  19. sapper

    sapper WW2 Veteran WW2 Veteran

    Oddly enough one of our best weapons was a length or rope. It saved innumerable lives .And would do today.... if the army was not so stupid. It was the rope that we "pulled" suspect mines out the ground, from a safe distance. If they went off, a life or two were saved, if they didn't then we just made them safe. Simple.... A great weapon.....The other great weapon was the mine dog they sniffed out a great many mines and traps..... Apart from the "Colonel"..A very large black Labrador that pulled its master onto a mine....
     
  20. Dave55

    Dave55 Atlanta, USA

    Spider:

    I think the LMG there is a Bren. If you are referring to the rifleman in the center of the picture his weapon does seem a little slender for an SMLE, at least from this angle. It's not long enough for a standard Arisaka, though.

    I always thought that the Arisakas were quite long too but I just checked and the Type 98, the SMLE III and No. 4 are all just over 44" . Surprised the heck out of me. Maybe it is their long bayonets that gave us the illusion of length?
     

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