State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

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Paul_G_Baker
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#136

Post by Paul_G_Baker » 09 Apr 2015, 18:55

Knouterer wrote:Before the Germans could have made any use of Folkestone, they would first have to take it, which would be a job in itself. The garrison of Sub-area A.4 (Folkestone, Sandgate, Shorncliffe, Hythe) was at least 6,000 strong - apart from troops of the 1st (London) Division in the vicinity - mostly consisting of Royal Engineer (training) units, who had had plenty of time to work on the defences. Up on the cliffs, there were three coast defence batteries with in total eight 6 inch and 5.5 inch guns (see modern picture for positions).

Quite useless duing the hours of darkness (of which there are around nine hours at that time of year, and vulnerable to being attacked by landed troops from the rear. Both troops and guns are also vulnerable to night bombing (HE + Incendiary - guided by Knickebein); serving both as a distraction and as sound-cover.

Blockship SS Umvoti (Details and larger picture on link)
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http://www.wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?118524

Just how much of SS Umvoti would be high and dry at low tide?
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Low tide outside the harbour entrance - looks like sand/mud to me!
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steverodgers801 wrote:To unload that kind of equipment if it is not available seems a catch 22.
Ships of that period used built-in equipment (called derricks) lo load/unload where the harbour didn't possess proper cranes - also when transferring cargo into barges - known as 'lighters'.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#137

Post by Knouterer » 09 Apr 2015, 22:07

We're getting a bit away from the topic of this thread, but OK ...

To gain a better understanding of the capabilities of the Seelöwe invasion fleet, it might be instructive to take a closer look at a "typical" ship, and for this exercice I propose the "Lauterfels", built by the AG. Weser in Bremen and launched in 1921. A few interesting pics that illustrate its "Werdegang":

http://www.ddghansa-shipsphotos.de/lauterfels200.htm

As indicated on this website, she was requisitioned by the KM on 23.7.1939 and was assigned to the Seelöwe fleet as RO46 in August 1940. According to Gröner, she (like her sister ships Birkenfels and Falkenfels) was at one point armed with 4 x 20 mm guns, and the pictures clearly show a raised wooden platform at the stern on which a single or twin 20 mm may have been mounted. On one picture there seems to be a similar structure on the forecastle.

The above website gives a crew of 72 including 39 "Inder" (what the British would call "lascars", I suppose). Gröner gives a wartime crew of 49 and a transport capacity of 1000 men, 121 horses and 70 vehicles. In addition, a dozen or so stevedores were put on each of the transports to assist with unloading.
It is interesting to compare this to similar-sized ships that the allies built (or converted) for similar purposes - ie landings on enemy held shores - later in the war, such as the British "Glen" class and the American Attack Transports.

The former at 9840 GRT could transport 3 LCMs, 24 LCAs, and 1098 troops. They carried 6 x 4" guns, 4 x 2pdr "Pom-Poms" and 8 x 20 mm. The crew was 523 strong.
The USN APAs (example: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/President_ ... _transport ) were similarly equipped and also carried crews of well over 500 men - almost ten times as many as the Lauterfels.

This difference is explained by the numerous landing craft crews, the AA gunners, the damage control parties, and the large medical staff and other specialists hat these ships carried.

One has to wonder how the men on the Lauterfels - civilians, not trained navy personnel - would have coped with gunfire, torpedoes and attack from the air, fighting fires and caring for wounded, while at the same time having to unload troops and cargo into lighters.

And on the subject of unloading, as Schenk also notes somewhere, such ships would normally be unloaded by dockside cranes. Where there were no harbours, or only primitive ones (let's say on the West African coast) they would use their own derricks/loading booms, but that would normally concern a limited amount of light cargo items (bales, crates). The Lauterfels, to stay with her, had only one 30-ton derrick - if that had been damaged, unloading tanks, for example, would have become a problem.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#138

Post by Knouterer » 09 Apr 2015, 22:26

Paul_G_Baker wrote:
Knouterer wrote:Before the Germans could have made any use of Folkestone, they would first have to take it, which would be a job in itself. The garrison of Sub-area A.4 (Folkestone, Sandgate, Shorncliffe, Hythe) was at least 6,000 strong - apart from troops of the 1st (London) Division in the vicinity - mostly consisting of Royal Engineer (training) units, who had had plenty of time to work on the defences. Up on the cliffs, there were three coast defence batteries with in total eight 6 inch and 5.5 inch guns (see modern picture for positions).

Quite useless duing the hours of darkness .
Not really - each of the emergency batteries had two searchlights with an effective range of about 2,800 yards. Apart from that, the Kriegsmarine considered a moonlit night as essential to keep the barge formations in some kind of order.

And furthermore, as noted before, before the Germans could do anything with Folkestone, they would have to take it, from the landward side - which brings us to the hours of daylight.

I might add that the two 9.2 inch guns of the Citadel battery at Dover (discussed above), about 7,500 m away, could have dropped a few shells into the harbour too from time to time, if it had been taken by the enemy.

And so could the heavy railway guns which had been assigned that specific task (two 9.2 inch guns at Littlestone, two 12 inch howitzers at Lyminge).
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#139

Post by Paul_G_Baker » 10 Apr 2015, 02:32

Knouterer wrote:And furthermore, as noted before, before the Germans could do anything with Folkestone, they would have to take it, from the landward side - which brings us to the hours of daylight.

Not necessarily, I think. Germans are good at Infiltration tactics and there are routes along both sides of the harbour area. Troops, using British weapons and ammunition, would be landing on the sand (from barges, in darkness, a Battalion + stores per Franz Christian-sized barge) during a night-long Air-Raid (one that had produced a fair amount of bombs and incendiaries); after all.
I might add that the two 9.2 inch guns of the Citadel battery at Dover (discussed above), about 7,500 m away, could have dropped a few shells into the harbour too from time to time, if it had been taken by the enemy.

Nope, don't think they could. Guns aren't howitzers - they fire flat-trajectory all the time and don't have adjustable charges. Citadel Battery is about 300 ft ASL, but - as far as I can work it out from Google Earth - there's a ridge at Capel le Ferne (about 100 ft higher) that'd get in the way. Then the shell has to avoid the heights behind Copt Point and its Martello Tower (about 81 ft or more) and plonk itself down at Sea Level inside a further half-mile. Unlikely, to say the least. Coastal Defence Batteries weren't intended (or sited) to fire upon inland targets.
And so could the heavy railway guns which had been assigned that specific task (two 9.2 inch guns at Littlestone, two 12 inch howitzers at Lyminge).

I'll give you the Howitzers at Lyminge; but at 87 tons 'in-action' and not, as far as I know, able to run - much less fire - on a 15" Gauge trackway I doubt the Littlestone guns were actually there at all. There are constraints applied by the limitations of track/roadbed (see what had to be done to bring that 18 inch Howiter onto the Elham Valley Line). Land-service 9.2 in Howitzers.... yes those are possible.

Assuming that all pre-war military facilities (plus any other detectable military targets in the Folkestone to Dymchurch area) had been given a hard pounding with HE and Incendiary by the twin-engine bombers belonging to a full Luftflotte AND that followed exactly the same treatment meted out on preceding nights at Ramsgate/Manston, Deal, East Dover and the Western Heights WITHOUT any follow-up landing; how long would it take Liardet (his HQ also included in the preparation targeting) and Thorne to recognise what's happening and to react to it?

How long after that would it take the defenders to get to the scene?
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#140

Post by Knouterer » 10 Apr 2015, 11:40

Re the Citadel Battery, that needs some research, but at a distance of 7,500 m the trajectory would hardly be "flat" and since these guns used separate bag charges, it seems quite possible that reduced charges for a more "howitzer-like" trajectory (and for training ... ) were on hand. At first glance, it should be possible to clear the obstacles in between.

Re the 9.2 in railway battery at Littlestone, a number of unimpeachable sources (i.e. the War Diaries of the units in question and higher commands) say that it was there. Not - obviously - on the "miniature" railway but on the "real" railway just behind it, between Littlestone and New Romney. Most likely, a separate spur was laid for the guns.

The "Return of Strength of the British Army 30 Sept. 1940" even states that two whole Railroad Construction Companies R.E. with over 500 men were at Littlestone at that date, but I have certain doubts about that.

Map fragment is from the early 1920s, before the miniature railway was built.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#141

Post by Knouterer » 10 Apr 2015, 12:04

Also, the Coast Defence batteries certainly were intended to engage targets on land, as a secondary role, and were provided with suitable ammunition for that role.

Collier (Official History) on the Emergency Batteries: “Their primary role was seaward defence. In order to save ammunition, conceal the positions of the batteries as long as possible and offset inexperience, the gunners were told to hold their fire until the enemy began to lose sea room some three to four miles from the shore; the guns would thus be limited to about half their effective maximum range of 12,000 yards. Beach defence was a secondary role. The guns and lights were carefully hidden with nets and bunting, later supplemented by disruptive painting.”

Maurice-Jones (History of the Coast Artillery, page 217): “The ammunition for both 9.2 inch and 6 inch guns had been improved during the period between the two wars (…) Armour-piercing shell with base fuses, which had optional delay/non-delay plugs, and H.E. shell with nose fuses for unarmoured vessels or for firing landwards were now the normal coast-defence ammunition”.

The War Office Textbook of Ammunition of 1936 has a drawing of a 6 inch coast defence H.E. shell indicating that it could be fitted with different types of nose fuse for firing seawards, landwards or against beach landings.

WO 199/523 “Coast Batteries R.A. – Formation Of” (June 1940-Aug. 1942) contains a note to the C.-in-C. of June 1941 on the subject of using the coast artillery against beach targets, which states:
“The average ammunition in emergency coast batteries (i.e. those not in the old permanent works) includes 100-150 rounds per gun fuse 44 and 15-30 rounds per gun shrapnel. These are both suitable for beach shooting.”
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#142

Post by Paul_G_Baker » 10 Apr 2015, 14:35

Knouterer wrote:Re the Citadel Battery, that needs some research, but at a distance of 7,500 m the trajectory would hardly be "flat" and since these guns used separate bag charges, it seems quite possible that reduced charges for a more "howitzer-like" trajectory (and for training ... ) were on hand. At first glance, it should be possible to clear the obstacles in between.
Wartime photos suggest Citadel Battery was equipped with Mk 5 Mountings; elevation limits -10 to +15. Full charge range = 21,000 yards (disregarding the 300 ft ASL of the Battery position, which would tend to increase the max range). While there was a reduced charge (half of the Full) used for practice, I have severe doubts that even that would bend the trajectory enough. Even the Mk 7 Mounting (-5 to +35, 36,700 yards) doesn't have the greater than 45 degree capability that would be required.

7,500 metres is hardly spitting distance for those weapons; which were designed for one purpose only - sending a shell through the thick side-amour of an enemy warship. Think of them as having the attributes of extra-large anti-tank guns.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#143

Post by Michael Kenny » 10 Apr 2015, 15:31

Paul_G_Baker wrote: 7,500 metres is hardly spitting distance for those weapons; which were designed for one purpose only - sending a shell through the thick side-amour of an enemy warship. Think of them as having the attributes of extra-large anti-tank guns.
So the guns would be no good at engaging lightly armoured Destroyers or non-armoured ships and were there to defend against an attack by Bismark and Tirpitz?

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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#144

Post by Paul_G_Baker » 10 Apr 2015, 17:08

Michael Kenny wrote:
Paul_G_Baker wrote: 7,500 metres is hardly spitting distance for those weapons; which were designed for one purpose only - sending a shell through the thick side-amour of an enemy warship. Think of them as having the attributes of extra-large anti-tank guns.
So the guns would be no good at engaging lightly armoured Destroyers or non-armoured ships and were there to defend against an attack by Bismark and Tirpitz?

Of course they can engage lightly armoured Destroyers or non-armoured ships (with a suitable shell/fuse) just as an anti-tank gun can act as a field-gun (but not as a Howitzer). However, engaging lightly armoured Destroyers or non-armoured ships isn't what they were primarily designed for - there were other guns that could do that - and do it cheaper too.

What's under discussion is a 9.2 inch Gun's trajectory - whether a Citadel Battery shell could land in Folkestone Harbour without hitting anything else on the way OR overshooting.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#145

Post by Knouterer » 10 Apr 2015, 19:06

Towards the end of the 19th century, it was decided to clear out the jumble of guns (including various muzzleloaders) then constituting the coast defences, and replace them with four types of gun:

9.2 inch for counterbombardment, i.e. against enemy battlecruisers and such which might try to attack ports (as happened in December 1914 at Hartlepool);
6 inch against bombardment at medium range by light cruisers;
4.7 inch against attempts to break down naval obstructions (booms) or block the entrance to a port or harbour;
12-pounders (3 inch) against attack (by night) by torpedo craft or similar.

All four types were still in service by the start of WWII, but the 4.7in and the 12pdrs were by then considered obsolete and the latter was about to be replaced by a twin six-pounder with a high rate of fire.

Naturally, there was some overlap and guns might have to fire at other targets than they were intended for.

There was a variety of ammunition available for the bigger guns; in July 1940 it was reported that the 9.2in guns in the "Fixed Defences" such as Dover had, on average, 250 APC and 25 HE rounds available, and it was proposed to change this, eventually, to 100 APC and 175 HE, reflecting (presumably) the fact that any invasion fleet would largely consist of "soft" targets, that is, not protected by thick armour belts.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#146

Post by Knouterer » 10 Apr 2015, 19:30

I don't think the defence of the United Kingdom hinged on the capability of Citadel Battery to drop shells into Folkestone Harbour - as noted above, the Germans were not even planning on taking Folkestone on S-day - but a look at the map does suggest that shooting past Copt Point it could still cover a good part of the harbour, and certainly ships trying to enter it.
And it doesn't seem unlikely that covering Folkestone was one of the considerations that played a role when the site for the battery was chosen.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#147

Post by Paul_G_Baker » 10 Apr 2015, 20:54

Here's the first problem - the ridge due south of Church Hougham
Image

And here's another - only the most Westerly gun can fire in the direction of Folkestone without endangering the other guncrew/gun!
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#148

Post by Knouterer » 11 Apr 2015, 11:12

Re the Citadel Battery, since a certain amount of work was done on it in 1939, I had more or less assumed that the mountings would have been upgraded to Mark VI (introduced in 1916) but apparently that was not the case and they still were the old Mark V which allowed only 15° elevation as noted above. In that case hitting Folkestone Harbour might indeed have been a problem, although I'm not quite convinced that it was impossible.
See also http://sussexhistoryforum.co.uk/index.php?topic=1054.0

Other heavy guns within range of Folkestone, apart from railway and coast defence guns, included two 6" Mk XIX guns (range 17,140 m) at Westenhanger. belonging to the 56th Heavy Regiment (Spike Milligan's Own). These had however other fire tasks and might have been overrun by the Fallschirmjäger early on. There was also one 9.2" howitzer at Aldington (range 12,740 m, so Folkestone was out of reach); two other 6" guns were at Wingham (Kent), and the rest of that regiment was scattered along the East Sussex coast.
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#149

Post by Paul_G_Baker » 11 Apr 2015, 13:07

So, what was the position re. unit transport in September? Were MOD standard designs stating to come though to formations like 1st (London), or were they still reliant on requisitioned commercial vehicles?

BTW, ran across this while searching the web (hoping for a photo of that blockship in its duty position - but no luck);
Image

Seabrook Promenade. No idea exactly when it was taken (and there's work still going on) but the defences seem rather sparse!

On Emergency Batteries:
Any idea if their instructions were to "Fire at 'Big Game', engaging small craft only if they were in large numbers", how many small craft made up a large enough number and how Barges would have been classed?
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Re: State of British Ground Forces, September 1940, Sealion

#150

Post by Gooner1 » 13 Apr 2015, 14:44

Paul_G_Baker wrote: BTW, ran across this while searching the web (hoping for a photo of that blockship in its duty position - but no luck);
Image

Seabrook Promenade. No idea exactly when it was taken (and there's work still going on) but the defences seem rather sparse!
Just well camouflaged!

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