Page 86 - History of War - Issue 05-14

TRENCH WARFARE
The wooden frame used
From the Australian manual with this rifle grenade
Grenades and their Uses, allows for steady shots
1916, showing a diagram at a consistent angle
of the West Spring Gun

emergency” were selected for training – with
a minimum of 12 NCOs an men per company degree of training and efficiency as
taking part. By October ideas were further refined grenadiers than the remainder. These
in The Training and Employment of Grenadiers, men will be able either to work with
which noted that: the platoon or to provide a reserve
The nature of operations in the present of grenadiers for any special object.
campaign has developed the employment of rifle A battalion “Bombing Officer”
and hand grenades both in attack and defence and an NCO per company were
to such an extent that the grenade has become to be allotted to assist in training
one of the principal weapons of trench warfare. and to organise the supply and
Every infantry soldier must, therefore, receive storage of grenades. To carry the numbers of wanted every seven days in July 1915,
instructions in grenade throwing. It has been grenades needed for bombing duels various with 1.4 million being demanded in August 1916.
found in practice, however, that some men do not forms of grenade waistcoat, bandolier, bag and Naturally it would be some time before such
possess the temperament or the qualifications “bomb bucket” were introduced. Flaming grenade ambitious production targets were achieved, so
necessary to make a really efficient grenadier. For bombers badges were initially worn unofficially, the British Army struggled through 1915 with a
this reason in every platoon there should be a and confirmed officially by an army order of 11 whole phalanx of less efficient grenades making
nucleus of one NCO and eight men with a higher October 1915. That month the “Grenadier Party” up the numbers.
had a revised complement of nine: an NCO Amongst these were not only factory-produced
in command; two bayonet men; two grenade improvements on the Jam Tin and Hairbrush but
Light machine guns throwers; two carriers and two spare men. oddities such as the friction pull “Pitcher”, the
The bayonet men were specifically ordered to “Lemon” and the “No. 15” ball grenade. The
While Germany could claim leads in the fields advance with magazines charged and a round Pitcher, light and heavy versions of which became
of the grenade, mortar and flamethrower, the “in the chamber” to protect the bombers “at all known as the Nos “13” and “14”, was widely
British had a definitive head start with the
machine gun. The Lewis gun was designed by The Mills bomb was an impressive performer:
an American before the war and was under
production in Birmingham by August 1914. tests confirmed that anybody within 10 yards of
The French had quickly come to the conclusion
that light machine weapons would be useful was certain to be hit by its fragments
for ‘walking fire’, in which a two-man team
could fire on the move. Unfortunately it was
some time before the 1915 model French costs”. The grenadiers were supposed to keep accepted as one of the most unreliable and
Chauchat could be made in quantity, and the both hands free for throwing, and the carriers dangerous bombs of the war: even the official
gun itself proved unreliable. At the eleventh to keep closed up enough to pass the grenades History of the Ministry of Munitions admitted
hour, US forces received what was arguably or take the place of a wounded comrade. that accidents were “so numerous that they won
one of the best light support weapons, the Spare men would carry up further supplies until for bombers the name of ‘Suicide Club’”. The
Browning automatic rifle, or “BAR”. Weighing required for other duties. Lemon bombs, Nos “6” and “7” were not as bad,
22lb it was lighter than the Lewis gun, and Once an objective was reached it was thought but activating them required such a Herculean
fired from a 20-round box magazine. Despite best to drive the enemy an additional 50 yards to pull that sometimes it was like removing a cork
some issues, it was capable of going where put him out of grenade range, and then establish from a bottle, and occasionally required two men
platoons and squads went and when it arrived two temporary barricades or blocks across the working together.
in the summer of 1918 it was more than a trench. The section of the trench wall between Parallel developments took place amongst
match for anything else used in this role. the two obstructions could then be pulled down the Germans, and grenadiers had certainly
to create a permanent block whilst the workers commenced working in concert by January
were covered by other members of the team. 1915. During the course of the year orders
By mid-1915 the powerful and distinctive were issued that “all infantrymen and pioneers
side-levered Mills bomb (or “No 5”), which must be trained in bombing just as thoroughly
would become synonymous with Tommy in the as they are trained with the rifle”. Soon the
trenches, had entered service. The Mills bomb Handgranatentrupp of half a dozen men was
was an impressive performer: tests confirmed being promoted for both offensive and defensive
that anybody within 10 yards of its explosion actions. In an attack, the assault groups moved
was well nigh certain to be hit by its fragments, as small scattered parties, not lines, and entered
and that between 10 and 20 yards away there the enemy works as swiftly as possible. Once
was a fair chance of injury. Weekly demand for there they rolled up the line, “bombing” along
Mills bombs was prodigious: half a million were the trench, throwing grenades over the traverses
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