British 9.2inch Mark I Howitzer

The design of the 9.2inch (234mm) Howitzer started in 1910. The contract went to the Coventry Ordnance Works, and the first gun was completed early in 1914, and tested in Wales. The design was formally approved in July 1914, and in August that year the first gun was sent to France, and it saw its first big action at Neuve Chapelle in early 1915 (this special gun became known as “Mother”. At the end of 1916 some 230 howitzers had been delivered to the British Army.

The 9.2in Mark I howitzer was a sturdy and well-thought-through design, with a hydro-pneumatic recoil system, which proved very reliable and soon became a standard British system. When moved, this big gun was of course broken down into loads, in this case three, and each was carried on a separate wagon. (Each wagon could be pulled by its own team of horses, or the three wagons could be interconnected, and pulled by a motorized tractor, like the Holt.) The only real problem with this potent gun, was that it was pretty short – because of the need to keep it compact enough to be pulled by horses – and as a consequence thereof it had a distinct tendency to go up a bit in the air when it was fired. In order to counter this a special “earth box” was used, attached to the front of the gun, and on deployment filled was filled with nine tons of earth.

The 9.2in Mark I could throw a 132kg HE shell to a maximum range of 9,186m. The rate of fire was two rounds per minute. The range was a bit short, and work started on a new design, the Mark II. At the same time, the Mark I soldiered on, and it was still in use when the war ended in 1918.

The gun shown here can be seen in the Imperial War Museum in London. It was earlier painted Bronze Green, but is now sporting the more Great War-ish multi-colour camouflage.

The photos below were taken by Mark Hansen, at the Australian War Museum in Canberra, whose WW1-collection is among the best in the world, and that contains a number of unique items.