Talk:BL 6-inch 26 cwt howitzer

Latest comment: 16 years ago by Nfe

According to AGL MacNaughton's article in the Canadian Defence Quarterly, Jan 1929, 6 in How in WW1 max rg was 9500. Gen McN was a gnr and an engineer and if he says 9500 then I'd believe it. It's easy enough to check there are quite a lot of RTs around. IV Hogg in Allied Arty of WW1 also gives 9500.

The ammo expenditure total actually comes from Farndale Annex B. (actually he says "Approx expenditure in France & Belgium", 22387363 for this gun. Not what I'd call approximate! The figure seems to have come from a presentation chart probably produced in the 1920s, my copy doesn't give any details about origin, etc.

6 in How was the most widely used gun by RGA in WW1, about 50% of their total.

A qty of these guns were delivered to Russia in 1917.Nfe 03:38, 16 November 2007 (UTC)Reply

In WW1 these guns were only used by UK and SA (according to Farndale Annex M). After WW1 they also entered service with at least Australia and Canada (according to their regimental histories). It's also possible that India 'inherited' some in 1947.

In 1939/40 they equipped the overwhelming majority of the BEF's medium regiments. In addition to N Africa they also equipped a few btys in Hong Kong.Nfe 03:57, 16 November 2007 (UTC)Reply

There are photos showing this gun being towed by Holt tractors in WW1 and on the NW Frontier after this. In WW1 the gun was used in all theatres less E Africa.

Hogg states that design started in Jan 1915, proof firing on 30 Jul 15 with 695 in service by the end of 1915. He gives total new build production in WW1 as 3633 including 212 provided to allies.Nfe (talk) 06:24, 22 December 2007 (UTC)Reply

'Allies' probably excludes imperial forces, SA had 6 btys in France and Canada 8 (not listed by Farndale but by Nicholson 'Gunners of Canada'). 4 RGA btys were at Gallipoli. In Nov 1918 the deployment of RGA 6in How btys was: UK - 6, France - 164, Italy - 21, Macedonia - 7, Palestine - 13, Mesopotamia - 6. Most btys had 6 guns a few had 4 and one bty was mixed eqpt with 2 (not included in totals above).Nfe (talk) 07:20, 22 December 2007 (UTC)Reply