some French friend sent me the foolowing pictures of a gun exposed in France, in the Vosges sector.
I am confused by the identification plaque found with the gun, that says it is a 88mm Skoda gun M 1875.
I personally see every single characteristic of a German 9cm K73 or K73/91 gun, very similar to this one in Belgrade
or this one in Mount Perry, Australia :
What are your opinions ?
Thanks !
Bernard
PS : the answer to that identification could have an provide an interesting clue to a long living enigma on WW1 witnesses in France. A huge quantity of French Soldiers battlefield memories, some of them coming from very accurate sources, pay a lot of respect to the effects of the Austrian 88mm guns, that were said to fire from very close distance and therefore whose departure noise was not heared before the arrival.
The problem is there is no official source that would confirm that old and obsolote Austrian guns type M75 or M75/96 or even M4 have been used on the western front.
So most of the experts think that these terrifying guns were in fact German 9cm K73 (or K73/91), and that the fact their shells had several copper belts was at the origin of a confusion saying they were Austrian.
The above gun, if really a C73 misnamed Austrian M1875, would prove the confusion...
The gun looks like the C73 restored by the Lovett Collection www.lovettartillery.com/9cm._C_1873_Kanone.html.
It's a pity the images didn't include a view of the breech - I'd expect it to look like the attached view of the Gatton C73 breech (the Gatton gun has its barrel inverted).
There don't seem to be any images of the Austrian M75 gun around on the Web but this gun had a sprung spade arrangement to reduce the length of recoil. Clearly this gun does not have this.
... I believe the piece is a Russian 87mm M1878. They were built under licence( see earlier tread on the subject ). Though a Krupp patented design, there were cosmetic differences in the Ruski version...... Most notably the 14 spoked wheels & wooden hubs. ( All-steel hubs were fitted to the C73/88 and older guns were largely retrofitted. ) And,... Somewhere along their production line, the Russians dropped the axle spring; which appears on all the German C73 series.
Incidently, the German guns were identified as 9cm to avoid ammunition supply confusion with their naval 8,8cm.
This might help with the identification of the Vosges gun.
I looked at the Gatton C73 yesterday (Wed) - some additional markings on the Gatton C73 are:
- stamped numbers on the right trunnion which look like a barrel weight - a cypher on the top of the barrel - I think this might be Kaiser Wilhelm I's cypher. - a very faint stamp on the left trunnion.
The barrel on the Gatton gun is installed upside down so getting an image of the cypher wasn't easy - the image has been processed with Gimp to try to highlight the details.
The Gatton gun was donated by the French Govt. so it isn't possible to say where it was captured. There is a belief it was captured in Palestine but this isn't certain.
Regards,
Charlie
-- Edited by CharlieC on Wednesday 6th of January 2010 11:26:18 PM
Barrel upside down ? The breach block screw is on the left as it should be. Perhaps I've misunderstood the remark.
The breach marked "1875" does not negate it's possibility of being Russian. Large orders for the gun were filled before the Orbuchov plant tooled up. Initially, German tubes were mated to Russian made carriages. Those tubes came "off the shelf" at Krupp warehouses where they likely had lain for years.
Of course, the Turk scenario is also completely plausible, and more likely. Turkey purchased the C73 in at least 2 different order lots. The Brits captured their first example at Basra. I still believe the wooden hubs almost certainly suggest a late century Krupp client as the original owner.
Barrel upside down ? The breach block screw is on the left as it should be. Perhaps I've misunderstood the remark.
The breach marked "1875" does not negate it's possibility of being Russian.
Large orders for the gun were filled before the Orbuchov plant tooled up. Initially, German tubes were mated to Russian made carriages. Those tubes came "off the shelf" at Krupp warehouses where they likely had lain for years.
Of course, the Turk scenario is also completely plausible, and more likely. Turkey purchased the C73 in at least 2 different order lots. The Brits captured their first example at Basra. I still believe the wooden hubs almost certainly suggest a late century Krupp client as the original owner.
Not really - the C73 at Gatton, Queensland has the barrel installed upside down. The Vosges gun is correctly assembled. The point I was making was that the breech markings on Vosges gun seem very similar to the breech markings on the Gatton gun. Since I've recently seen the Gatton gun I thought that the other markings might be useful in confirming the identity of the barrel.
The Turkish C73s seem to have both Krupp and locally made barrels. The manufacture date on the Turkish made barrels, in the one case I know about where the old script as been translated, is much later than 1875. It's reasonable that a similar arrangement between Krupp and the Russian Govt. would apply.
It's also possible that this is a Russian gun, captured by the Turks in 1914-16 in the Caucasus Campaigns, used in the Turkish army and then captured again by the Allies in Palestine. Alternatively, it could have been captured by the Germans on the Eastern Front and given to the Turks. There are a fair number of captured Turkish C73s in Australia - it would be worth searching the barrel markings to see if there are any Russian guns among them.
i had a friend of mine going to see the gun in France inspected again, and he took the following picture
We can read a "Kp", this gun is a Krupp 9cm C/73. I also had some drawings that are really self-explanatory and match perfectly with this gun.
The presence of C/73 guns in France is not surprising at all, since these old obsolete guns were widely used by the Landsturm and reserve units of the FussArtillerie.
Thanks all for your help !
Bernard
-- Edited by Guns1418 on Thursday 7th of January 2010 04:29:50 AM
