The BL 18-inch railway howitzer (formally Ordnance BL 18-inch Mk I howitzer on truck, railway) was a British railway gun developed during World War I. Part of the progression of ever-larger howitzers on the Western Front, it did not enter service until 1920.
Five guns and two complete equipments on railway wagons were produced. After World War I there was no use for such large but relatively short-ranged weapons and they were placed in storage. In World War II the two wagons were used to mount 13.5-inch guns, which were capable of engaging targets on the German-occupied Channel coast of France. In late 1940 one 18-inch howitzer was mounted on the railway mounting nicknamed "Boche Buster" which had been used in World War I to carry a 14-inch gun.
Deployment to Kent, 1940
In 1940 there were concerns that an enemy invasion was imminent, crossing the English Channel from France. Three heavy rail-mounted guns were deployed on the Elham Valley Railway line in Kent. The railway route followed a meandering course, enabling the guns to be trained by moving them along the line to a suitable location. The wooded landscape also gave cover for the guns.
The heaviest gun was stationed at Bourne Park, where there was a short tunnel; the gun could be stood down in the tunnel, avoiding enemy attack. The other two guns were deployed to Elham railway station. The guns remained in the area for the greater part of the hostilities.
The howitzer gun at Bourne, the so-called "Boche Buster", had a barrel of 18 inches diameter and was, apart from a ponderous and unreliable Russian siege cannon, the largest railway gun in Europe (note that Schwerer Gustav did not enter service until 1941, so in 1940 the 18 inch was the biggest). It had originally had a 14-inch barrel during World War I, and the last action in which it fired was in 1916 when three rounds completely destroyed the railway station at Arras in France. The gun was then stored at Nottingham until early in 1940, when the authorities realised the potential of the weapon for military defence.
It was fitted with an 18-inch naval barrel at the Darlington railway works in the spring of 1940. The barrel was one of several that had been removed from British battleships following the Washington Naval Treaty in 1922, which banned very large naval guns.[citation needed]
It was manned by 50 men and several specialist gunnery officers from the 2nd Regiment of the Royal Artillery. The complete battery, including Royal Engineers to work the railway locomotives and supervise track work, numbered 80 men and was known as the 11th Super Heavy Battery. After initial training at Catterick Camp in the summer and autumn of 1940, the 11th Super Heavy Battery, under the command of Major Boyle, moved to Kent in early January 1941. For the journey the gun was disguised as three banana wagons by the skilful use of steel hoops and canvas. At 250 tons all up, the gun was far in excess of the weight limit of the Elham railway, and considerable strengthening works were carried out. It arrived at Bishopsbourne in February, and arrangements were made to store it in the tunnel at Bourne Park. This had originally had two tracks, but had been reduced to single track as an economy measure before the war. To allow through trains to pass while the gun was there, the second track was reinstated. The shells were 6ft 7in (2.01m) high, each weighing 1+1⁄4 long tons (1,300kg), and transferring them was a long and arduous job despite the use of special hoists. At Bishopsbourne station itself arrangements were made to allow mess and sleeping coaches to be shunted into the siding.
The gun was first fired, for calibration tests, on the morning of 13 February 1941, when the equipment was towed to a stretch of track near the Black Robin public house, Kingston. Several rounds were fired out into mid-channel, the results of which were sighted and marked by observation posts on the cliffs at Dover. In the Kingston and Barham area villagers were warned to open doors and windows, but the blasts were so severe that in many cases houses were damaged. The gun was fired on only two other occasions, shortly after the first; one at the World's Wonder bridge between Barham and Elham and the other at Lickpot bridge, Elham.
The railway track had to be altered whenever the gun was run out for firing. At the places where the army decided the gun was most likely to be used in countering an invasion threat, the track was strengthened and the sleeper spacing reduced. The recoil on firing made the gun run back 20ft (6.1m), and even then tended to distort the track. A 200-yard spur railway line was laid into the fields, just north of Kingston village, in order to allow the gun to train on the beaches at Sandwich Bay and Pegwell Bay, as well as the Straits of Dover and the English Channel approaches.
On 20 June 1941, the "Boche Buster" was inspected by Winston Churchill at Bishopsbourne station, and later that day the Prime Minister viewed the smaller guns at Elham.
In 1944 the army decided that all the guns would be more useful in the Allies' drive towards Germany and they were taken to Salisbury Plain for testing prior to the invasion of Normandy.[2]
The four BL 18-inch railway howitzers that were deployed during the Second World War were all scrapped in the post-war period.[3]
Only the gun from the fifth howitzer, named "barrel number one", survives,[4] it was used for artillery testing at MoD Shoeburyness in 1920 before being put into storage at the Royal Arsenal at Woolwich.[4] In 1940 it returned to Shoeburyness to be used again for experimental firings.[4] Post war it continued to be used until 1959.[4] Its final series of tests was firing experimental 1,000lb (450kg) cannon shells using much reduced charges.[4]
After decades in storage, the barrel was put on public display at Larkhill, when the Royal Artillery relocated there in 2008 with the closure of its Woolwich Barracks. In March 2013 it was loaned to the Spoorwegmuseum, the Dutch national rail museum.[5]
In September 2013 it was moved back to the Royal Armouries artillery museum at Fort Nelson, Hampshire.[3] It is mounted on a proofing carriage, a gun carriage with very limited elevation and traverse intended for test firing.
Barton, Keith; Buxton, Ian L. & Williams, A. G. (2001). "Question 35/00: British 18-inch Guns". Warship International. XXXVIII (3). International Naval Research Organization: 249–250. ISSN0043-0374.
Martin Mill is a village in east Kent, England. It takes its name from the nearby village of Martin. Martin Mill railway station is on the Dover to Deal railway line. The population of the village was, similarly to Martin, included in the civil parish of Langdon.
A railway gun, also called a railroad gun, is a large artillery piece, often surplus naval artillery, mounted on, transported by, and fired from a specially designed railway wagon. Many countries have built railway guns, but the best-known are the large Krupp-built pieces used by Germany in World War I and World War II. Smaller guns were often part of an armoured train. They were only able to be moved where there were good tracks, which could be destroyed by artillery bombardment or airstrike. Railway guns were phased out after World War II.
The BL 4.5 inch medium gun was a British gun used by field artillery in the Second World War for counter-battery fire. Developed as a replacement for the BL 60-pounder gun it used the same carriage as the BL 5.5-inch medium gun but fired a lighter round further.
Etchinghill is a village in Kent, England, about 5 km north of Hythe, and 1 km north of the Channel Tunnel terminal at Cheriton, near Folkestone. It is in the civil parish of Lyminge.
This article explains terms used for the British Armed Forces' ordnance (weapons) and ammunition. The terms may have different meanings depending on its usage in another country's military.
The BL 8-inch howitzer Marks VI, VII and VIII were a series of British artillery siege howitzers on mobile carriages of a new design introduced in World War I. They were designed by Vickers in Britain and produced by all four British artillery manufacturers but mainly by Armstrong and one American company. They were the equivalents of the German 21 cm Morser 16 and in British service were used similarly to the BL 9.2-inch howitzer but were quicker to manufacture and more mobile. They delivered a 200 lb (91 kg) shell to 12,300 yd. They had limited service in the British Army in World War II before being converted to the new 7.2 in (180 mm) calibre. They also equipped a small number of Australian and Canadian batteries in World War I and by the US Army in that war. They were used in small numbers by other European armies.
The Ordnance QF 13-pounder (quick-firing) field gun was the standard equipment of the British and Canadian Royal Horse Artillery at the outbreak of World War I.
The BL 18-inch Mk I naval gun was a breech-loading naval rifle used by the Royal Navy during World War I. It was the largest and heaviest gun ever used by the British. Only the Second-World-War Japanese 46 cm/45 Type 94 had a larger calibre, 18.1 inches (46 cm), but it fired a lighter shell. The gun was a scaled-up version of the BL 15 inch Mk I naval gun and was developed to equip the "large light cruiser" Furious. Its barrel length of 60 ft (18 m) was just 40 calibres, slightly limiting its muzzle velocity.
The Elham Valley Railway was a line connecting Folkestone and Canterbury in Kent, England. It opened between 1887 and 1889 and closed in 1947.
The BL 8-inch howitzer Mark I through to Mark V were a British improvisation developed early in the First World War to provide heavy artillery. It used shortened and bored-out barrels from various redundant naval 6-inch guns.
The Ordnance BL 9.2-inch howitzer was a heavy siege howitzer that formed the principal counter-battery equipment of British forces in France in World War I. It equipped a substantial number of siege batteries of the Royal Garrison Artillery. During World War II a limited number were used in the Battle of France, with the remainder being kept in the United Kingdom.
The British Ordnance BL 12 inch howitzer on truck, railway, a type of railway gun, was developed following the success of the 9.2-inch siege howitzer. It was similar but unrelated to the 12-inch siege howitzers Mk II and IV.
The British Ordnance BL 9.2 inch gun on truck, railway mounted a variety of surplus 9.2 inch naval guns, together with the custom-designed Mk XIII railway gun, on various railway platforms to provide mobile long-range heavy artillery on the Western Front in World War I. Mk XIII remained in service for British home defence in World War II.
The Ordnance BL 12-inch howitzer was a scaled-up version of the successful BL 9.2-inch siege howitzer.
The British BL 6-inch gun Mk XIX was introduced in 1916 as a lighter and longer-range field gun replacement for the obsolescent BL 6-inch gun Mk VII.
The QF 6-inch 40 calibre naval gun (Quick-Firing) was used by many United Kingdom-built warships around the end of the 19th century and the start of the 20th century. In British service it was known as the QF 6-inch Mk I, II, III guns. As the 15 cm/40 (6") 41st Year Type naval gun it was used for pre-dreadnought battleships, armoured cruisers and protected cruisers of the early Imperial Japanese Navy built in UK and European shipyards. It was also the heaviest gun ever carried by a pre-Cold War destroyer.
Ordnance BL 14-inch gun on truck, railway were 2 British 14-inch Mk III naval guns mounted on railway carriages, used on the Western Front in 1918. The guns had a very brief service life and were scrapped in 1926, but their railway carriages were re-used for mounting guns in World War II.
The Mortier 280 mm TR de Schneider sur affût-chenilles St Chamond was a French self-propelled siege howitzer designed during the First World War and used during the Second World War.
The Obusier de 400 Modèle 1915/1916 were French railway howitzers that saw action during the First World War and World War II. The mle 1915/1916 was the largest caliber railway howitzers in service with the French Army during the First World War.
Bishopsbourne was a station on the Elham Valley Railway. It opened in 1889 and closed to passengers in 1940 and freight in 1947.
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