Landships II

Tim, I have a copy of the older Osprey title "Flak Jackets", which has a few pages of text and a plate about the Great War; also the newer "Italian Army, 1914-18" which has a plate and some photos of the Arditi. If this would be helpful, let me know and I will forward some scans to you. 

Hope these are of some use

Paul

Paul, Thanks a million, those will come in handy.

 

James, Thank you, I would appreciate those photo's if you can find them, Also I will look for that book.

Thanks Guys.

All the Best

Tim R

British body armor:

Best regards from Spain

 

Centurion, Thank you, and yes I have them, But I appreciate the thought.

 

Thanks to every one for your kind help.

  Eugene, I need some Russian stuff, Help!!!!!

All the best

Tim R

Scan away my friend, I appreciate all information.

All the best

Tim R

Hi,

These pictures are from a new book on Austro-Hungarian stormtroopers. It says that Austro-Hungarian troopers did not use body-armour, only Italians experimented with it (on the A-H fronts) with not much success as it made movement very difficult. However, there are these pictures of infantry shields in use.

Sniper with a shield by his leg:

A-H army used two types of helmets: the so-called Berndorfer produced by the Arthur Krupp Metallwarenfabrik A.G. in Berndorf, and the 16M German pattern helmet which was produced by the Manfred Weiss Works in Budapest under licence. Both could be strenghtened with Stirnshildes (forehead shields) for extra protection, but these were only suggested to used by machine gunners and static guards as it also made movement very difficult because of the weight. On the other hand it could withstand smal arms bullets.

-- Edited by McGuba at 19:43, 2007-01-04

Sorry for being late...

From the book:

In 1917 an Austro-Hungarian sturmbattalion should had:

-         four assault companies

-         one or two machine gunner companies

-         a mountain gun battery with four guns (presumably 7,5cm M15)

-         an infantry gun battery with four guns (presumably 3,7cm M15)

-         a “Kampfmittelgruppe” (medium battle group?) with four medium grenade launchers  

       and  four medium mortars

-         a flamethrower squad with six flamethrowers

-         a sapper company

An assault company had four officers and 135 non-commissioned officers and soldiers.

There was a directive that all infantry divisions should had a sturm/assault battalion by late 1917, but the schedule was extended to January, 1918.

 

On flamethrowers: Austro-Hungarian sturmtruppen (German) / rohamcsapat (Hungarian) units preferred to use the lighter, portable versions. The first type, the 1915 M. 50 litres flamethrower was ready for use in January 1915, but it proved to be too heavy for the assault units. It used different oil derivatives as flammable fluid. Its effective range reached 25-60 meters. The lighter, 1915 M. 22 litres and 1915 M. 15 litres versions appeared from 1916, and were better suited for use with the sturmtruppen.

 

As it can be seen on the pictures even these lighter versions needed at least two “rohamista” (Hungarian, informal, should be “assaultist”) soldiers to operate.

 

Strange. I tried it on different computers and I could see them.

Nevertheless, I uploaded them to my under-develompment K. u. k. General homepage:

http://kukgen.fw.hu/

It is in the Galleries/Infantry section.