Mortar, 60mm, Shoulder Fired
The American PIAT?
A few days ago, while looking for information about the 155mm mortar, I ran into a description of another piece of ‘hip-pocket artillery’ that had escaped my attention. In a ‘micro-published’ War Department manual from June of 1944, I read the following.
The shoulder fired 60mm Mortar is a development proposed by a member of the Marine Corps.
It is of the recoil type, consisting of a 60mm mortar tube partly enveloped by a sleeve containing a spring recoil mechanism which absorbs the recoil and returns the tube to firing position.
A trigger activated firing mechanism fires the standard H. E. (high explosive) M49A2 shell with cartridge only, used in this weapon.
Recoil of the mortar tube cocks the firing mechanism.
The mortar is supported by a bipod with folding legs and has a rectangular shoulder rest attached to the rear end bf the sleeve.
A bar sight adjustable for elevation by means of a knurled knob is fastened to the left side of the sleeve.
With this mortar it is possible to obtain hits on a 61 x 61 target at ranges up to 600 yards.
It is recognized that the heavy recoil of this weapon places a severe strain on the operator.
Subsequent searching turned up a twenty-page pamphlet, published by the Bureau of Ordnance of the US Navy in September of 1944, that provided both instructions for field stripping the shoulder-fired mortar and photos of Marines demonstrating various modes of handling the weapon. (While some of these techniques honored the nomenclature of the piece, others employed the ground, rather than a collar-bone, to absorb its recoil.)
In 1944, Marines of the 1st Marine Division employed the shoulder mortar during the landing operation on Peleliu. The weapon, alas, proved less useful than the anti-tank rocket launchers of the era. In the words of Frank O. Hough, the author of the official Marine Corps monograph on the battle
Some of its parts proved not rugged enough for sustained use and had to be replaced nearly as often as the poor devils who were obliged to fire the contraption from their shoulders. Essentially its functions duplicated those of the bazooka, and its adoption resulted from the frequent failure of bazooka rockets to detonate in the soft mud of Cape Gloucester. However, there proved to be very little soft ground amid the coral of Peleliu and, although the shoulder mortar was used effectively, it came to be considered less practical all around than the weapon it had been designed to replace.
Sources
War Department (G-3) Weapons for Jungle Warfare (21 June 1944) pages 85-87 (Combined Arms Research Library)
Navy Department (Bureau of Ordnance) Ordnance Pamphlet 1257 Garrett 60mm Shoulder Mortar Mark 1 Mod 0 (Internet Archive)
Frank O. Hough Assault on Peleliu (Washington: USMC, 1950) pages 32-33 (History Division, MCU)
For Further Reading
What weapon designers will not do to the human body! This is rather like a perverse marriage between a PIAT, an M19 Mortar and an M79 Grenade Launcher 😲
Marines may want to be supermen, but this was kryptonite. OTOH, the concept with the bipod or a plate braced against a vertical object continues with the modern 60mm. Fires at charge 2 or below.
A Master Gunner we once met with also offered that if the enemy was that close, simply throw like large darts or use as clubs.