Big Bertha.

This is coolbert:

Here is an excerpt regarding the use of the siege mortars at Liege. From the book, "The Guns of August". By Barbara Tuchman. If you have not read this book, do so. Excellent. I recall reading maybe my freshman year in high school.

[Belgian neutrality had been violated during the early days of World War One. Belgium had not been expected to fight back. When the Belgians resisted, the Germans were obligated to storm the forts surrounding Liege and Namur. Frontal assault by massed formations of German troops was unsuccessful. Necessitating the use of the siege mortars.]

"The German schedule could allow no such period to reduce the Belgian forts . . . German thoroughness required that every contingency be provided for. The problem was to design the heaviest possible anti-fortification gun that could be transported overland. it had to be a mortar or short-barreled howitzer with high angle of fire capable of lobbing shells onto the tops of the forts and yet, without the rifling of a long barrel, have sufficient accuracy to hit a specific target."

"Krupp's, working in iron secrecy, was ready with a model of the 420 [Big Bertha] in 1909. The sawed-off bloated giant, though fired successfully, proved excessively cumbersome to move. It had to be transported by rail in two sections each requiring, a locomotive to pull it. Spur tracks had to be laid to bring the gun to its emplacement pit, which, owing to the tremendous downward thrust of the recoil, had to be dug several yards deep and filled with concrete in which the gun was embedded and from which it could be only released by blasting. The emplacement process required 6 hours."

"The Austrian Skoda 305's, completed in 1910, had the advantage of superior mobility. Motor-drawn in three sections consisting of gun, mount, and portable foundation, they could travel 15 to 20 miles in a day . . . At the point of emplacement, the portable steel foundation was set down, the mount bolted to it, and the gun fitted to the mount, the whole process requiring 40 minutes . . . They could be swung right or left to an angle of 60 degrees and had a range of 7 miles. Like the 420's they fired an armor-piercing shell with a delayed action fuse allowing the explosion to take place after penetration of the target."

. . . .

"Liege was cut of from the outside world; when the great black weapons [Big Bertha] reached the outskirts within range of the forts . . . Their squat barrels, doubled by the recoil cylinders that grew on their backs like tumors, pointed cavernous mouths upward at the sky . . . Its crew, wearing padding over eyes, ears, and mouth, lay flat on their stomachs ready for the firing which was done electrically at a distance of 300 yards . . . The shell rose in an arc 4,000 feet high and took 60 seconds to reach its target. When it hit, a great conical cloud of dust, debris, and smoke rose a thousand feet in the air. Meanwhile the Skoda 305's had also been brought up, and began bombardment of other forts, 'walked in' upon their targets by artillery observers . . . Men of the Belgian garrisons heard the shells descending with a screaming whistle, felt the detonations coming each time more nearly overhead as the aiming was corrected until, as their terror mounted, the shells exploded upon them with deafening crash and the solid steel heads smashed through the concrete. Over and over the shells came, blowing men to bits, choking them with fumes released by the charge of high explosives. Ceiling fell in, galleries were blocked, fire, gas and noise filled the underground chambers, men became 'hysterical, even mad in the awful apprehension of the next shot.'"

"Before the guns went into action only one fort had been taken by assault [this was on August 12] . . . By August 16 eleven of the twelve forts had fallen"

One need not say any more. Just don't be on the receiving end!!

coolbert.