Heavy Field Howitzers (XIII)
Armies of the First World War
As the German Empire was fighting a two-front war, it could not devote all of its heavy field howitzers to the Western Front.1 Nonetheless, the fact that it had mobilized so many such weapons and the fact that the Western Allies had mobilized so few combined to create a situation where nine out of ten heavy field howitzers deployed to the Western Front at the start of the war belonged to batteries in the service of Kaiser Wilhelm.
The German advantage was even more pronounced where state-of-the-art weapons were concerned. More than half of the German heavy field howitzers had efficient recoil-absorbing mechanisms. Less than a tenth of the total number of heavy field howitzers deployed by Germany’s foes in France and Flanders (all of which were Belgian) were so equipped. Even if one includes the unwieldy Rimailho howitzer in the category of “state-of-the-art" weapons, it is clear that the German heavy field howitzers were not only more numerous than those of their opponents, they were also, on the whole, significantly better.
As dramatic as it was, the German advantage in the realm of heavy field howitzers had a relatively modest impact on the first few weeks of fighting on the Western Front. Where German forces encountered French and Belgian fortresses, the heavy field howitzer was little more than an auxiliary to heavier pieces.2 Where German forces engaged French, British, or Belgian formations in the open field, the outcome of the affair was usually decided well before the heavy field howitzers came into play.3
By the middle of September, however, the heavy field howitzer had begun to play a much more significant role.4 (Writing at this time, the commanding general of a French army corps characterized the long-range bombardments inflicted upon his command after 17 September 1914 as “much more powerful and infinitely more murderous” than those it had experienced prior to that date.)5 Surprisingly, the virtue that made possible this quantum increase in effectiveness had little to do with a howitzer’s ability to fire relatively heavy shells at relatively high angles. Rather, what made the German heavy field howitzer so useful to its owners in the autumn of 1914 was the simple fact that it could shoot much further than French, British and Belgian field guns.
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Comparing the detailed order of battle provided by the German official history with sources that identify the armament of various German artillery units suggests that the number of German heavy field howitzers deployed to the Eastern Front at the start of World War I could have been as low as 182 or as high as 246. The one thing that is certain is that at least 80 of these weapons were of types equipped with on-carriage recoil absorbing mechanisms. Germany, Reichsarchiv. Der Welkrieg, 2. Band, Die Befreiung Ostpreußens, (Berlin: E. S. Mittler und Sohn, 1925), Anlage 1, Kriegsgliederungen.
An exception to this general rule is provided by the French fortress at Longwy, where most of the defenders fought from recently built field fortifications. Longwy fell to a German infantry brigade that had been reinforced by a small number of field artillery pieces and heavy field howitzers. Julius Rébold, La Guerre de Forteresse, 1914-1918, (Paris: Payot, 1936), pages 116-17
A number of engagements from the first few weeks of the war on the Western Front have been made the subject of special studies. Among the best of these are the monographs written in the 1920s by Alphonse Grasset for the series La Guerre en Action, the articles that A.H. Burne published in The Fighting Forces and Army Quarterly in the 1930s, and Archibald F. Becke, The Royal Regiment of Artillery at Le Cateau, (Woolwich: Royal Artillery Institution, 1919.)
Frédéric Georges Herr L’Artillerie, Ce Qu’elle a Été, Ce Qu’elle Est, Ce Qu’elle Doit Être (Paris: Berger-Levrault, 1924), page 27