In 1918, the French withdrew the eight Canon de 305 Modèle 1893/1896 TAZ (Tout-Azimuth) railway guns which had been in service since 1916 in order to refit them. The main reason for this was that the 305mm guns were simply too large a caliber for the carriages and so it was decided to replace them with a smaller gun. Chosen were eight Canon de 240 de Côte Modèle 1893 coastal defense guns that had originally been installed in French forts located in Dakar, Senegal and Saigon, Vietnam. The St. Chamond company, who constructed the 305mm railway gun carriage, handled the required modifications in order to fit the 240mm guns. The work was completed and in 1918, the Canon de 240 Modèle 1893/1896 TAZ railway guns were deployed and served out the remainder of World War One.
The guns, sometimes nicknamed the “Colonies” due to them having been taken from French colonies, fired a 357lb. high-explosive shell to a maximum range of 15 miles. The shell used a separate powder charge and a trained crew could fire one round every three minutes. The gun sat on a turntable which could traverse 360 degrees but in practice, it was never traversed more than 10 degrees from either side of the centerline of the carriage due to instability caused by the recoil. When traversed, the gun had an elevation of 15 degrees up to 35 degrees but if the gun was parallel to the carriage, maximum elevation was only 29 degrees. Any higher and the breech would strike the carriage during recoil. The carriage, once a firing position was chosen, was ground anchored in place to help absorb some of the vertical forces created by firing. In addition, outriggers and screw jacks were used to create stability in the carriage. Finally, to lessen some of the recoil forces, there was a 4 degree elevated ramp the gun cradle rode up on before returning to battery. Loading the gun was accomplished by a elevated shell trolley at the rear of the carriage.
The photograph depicts one of the Canon de 240 Modèle 1893/1896 TAZ guns, having just fired. Each of the gun crew visible are wearing the metal canister that held the Modèle 1917 Appareil Respiratoire Spécial (ARS 17) gas mask and so this can date the photograph to at least 1918 when the gun was in service or possibly in the immediate post-WW1 years as the ARS17 continued to be issued until it was replaced with the Modèle 1920 Appareil Respiratoire Spécial. This suggests that, despite the rather exposed firing position, the gun was in action rather than firing on a range. The crew has traversed the gun 90 degrees and has only deployed four of the eight outriggers. It is possible the powder charge was lessened to reduce the chance of the recoil tipping the carriage over or the crew was simply taking their chances. As was usual, none of the men remained on the carriage when the gun was fired. The man nearest the carriage was the gunner, having been the one who pulled the lanyard which fired the cannon. The box car held the powder and ammunition for the gun as well as other supplies. Wheelbarrows and railroad ties can be seen, the latter likely used during the construction of the ground anchors.
When World War Two started, the eight guns were still in service with the 374e Regiment Artillerie Lourde sur Voie Ferrée (ALVF; Heavy Artillery on Railroad), four guns with the 10e Bataillon ALVF and four with the 11e Bataillon AVLF. These guns were situated in the south of France and all of them fell intact into German hands following a brief period of combat against Italian forces in June 1940. As was common practice for the Germans, they were pressed into service as the 24cm Kanone (E) 558 (f) and all eight were incorporated into the Atlantikwall (Atlantic Wall) coastal defenses that ran from the continental European coast all the way up through the Scandinavian coast. Four guns were positioned in Saint-Nazaire, France while the other four were sent to Narvik, Norway in 1942 before moving to Nærbø, Norway sometime in 1944.
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