On June 2, 1942, the Germans launched Operation Störfang (Sturgeon Catch) to take the Russian held port city of Sevastopol once and for all. Rather than launch conventional attacks as before which got them nowhere, the Germans instead elected for siege warfare, intending to pound the defenders into submission using heavy artillery before sending in ground forces. To do this, the 306. Artilleriekommando der Armee (Army Artillery Command) assembled the biggest siege guns and heavy artillery that could be had under the 11. Armee. All together, nine artillery battalions and three heavy and railroad artillery batteries came together, including elements from Artillerie-Bataillon 672 which fielded the massive 80cm Schwerer Gustav railway gun, Schweres Mörser-Bataillon 833 which operated two of the huge 60cm Karl-Gerät self-propelled siege mortars, and Schwere Artillerie-Batterie 459 that operated the sole remaining Krupp built 42cm Gamma-Gerät siege gun. Also in that number was Artillerie-Bataillon 744 and this unit and the guns it was equipped with is the subject of the photograph.
Obscured by gun smoke and dust kicked up after firing is one of two 28cm Haubitze L/12 ( H L/12) heavy siege howitzers operated by Artillerie-Bataillon 744 during Operation Störfang. The gun was originally designed as a coastal howitzer (Küstenhaubitze) that was to be placed near critical coastal infrastructure and it was designed to fire projectiles at a high-angle so as to come down onto the thinner armor of a warship's decking rather than the much thicker belt armor (meaning, the sides). As a coastal defense gun, it was mounted on a turntable set into concrete and to protect the gun and crew, it had a 60mm thick armored dome fitted to it. The entire assembly was called the Mittelpivotlafette C/92 (Center Pivot Mount C/92). The H L/12 entered service in 1892 with a four gun battery being deployed in Tsingtao, China to defend the German colony there while another battery protected the ports of Wilhelmshaven and Blankenberge in Belgium. The only other user of the howitzer was Portugal who bought several of the guns in 1902 to protect the port of Lisbon. While the exact number of howitzers built by Krupp isn't known, some survived World War One and remained in the hands of the Reichswehr and ultimately it is believed nineteen examples were still on inventory at the start of World War Two. Long by this time, the howitzer had passed into obsolescence when the ranges of main guns mounted on warships exceeded that of the howitzer. Still, the artillery forces of the Wehrmacht lacked heavy siege guns and so a small number were pulled from static defensive locations in order to deploy them in the field. To do this required significant manpower, effort, and time.
To transport the H L/12 required four loads: the barrel, the cradle, the gun mounting, and the components of the wooden ground platform. Once a suitable firing position was selected, a pit was dug and once that was completed, the wooden platform was assembled within the pit. After the platform was completed, the gun mount was fitted and secured down on the platform then the gun cradle and finally the barrel itself was installed. All together, to set up a single howitzer took between three to four days. The length of the H L/12 was 11.1 feet and the combat weight was 49.5 tons. The gun mounting provided a full 360 degree rotation thanks to a turntable situated on the bottom of the mounting. The maximum elevation of the gun was 65 degrees but the mounting provided no gun depression. The H L/12 used a horizontal sliding block breech and was percussion fired. Recoil absorption was by way of two hydraulic-pneumatic recuperator cylinders with additional absorption coming from the inclined plane of the gun mounting. The howitzer only fired one type of ammunition, the 28cm Sprenggranate L/3.5 high-explosive shell that weighed 772 pounds. To effect the maximum range of 6.5 miles, a seven-part powder charge that weighed 38 pounds was used. The H L/12 was not overly accurate and the effective range was a bit less at 6.2 miles. Against ships, the shell was able to penetrate 100mm of desk armor at a 63 degree angle. To facilitate loading, a crane was fitted to the gun mount and a trained crew could fire one round every one to four minutes. While the lack of accuracy of the H L/12 was an issue against mobile warships, against stationary targets like a city, the howitzer was more than effective in delivering its share of devastation.
All told, the artillery amassed under 11. Armee dropped 46,750 tons of ordnance on Sevastopol and when the Germans took the city on July 4, 1942, only eleven buildings still stood without damage following both the artillery bombardment and the aerial bombing campaign. Although a German victory, the Germans suffered 27, 412 casualties and the Romanians 8,454 casualties in comparison to 118,000 Soviet casualties.
The H L/12 howitzers would appear again in combat, this time during the Warsaw Uprising which commenced on August 1, 1944. There, the howitzers contributed to the purposeful destruction of Warsaw during the combat (which ended on October 2, 1944) and afterwards. By January 1945, some 85% of Warsaw was destroyed. The scale of the destruction was immense with 10,455 buildings, 923 historical buildings, 25 churches, 12 libraries, 81 primary schools, 64 high schools, and 2 universities being razed to the ground.
No comments:
Post a Comment