Schiessliste - I.Btl./Fußartillerie-Regiment 10

[IrishGunner]

Andreas and I have exchanged a couple emails to sort out the Schießtafel in Post #3; thought I would share with the crowd in case anyone is interested.

Below is what is I know about this fire plan based upon translation and an understanding of artillery fire.

The first number on the left - “9” - is the duration in minutes to shoot at this particular target. The second column reflects “x bis x+9” - “x” being the start of the fire plan and “x+9” being 9 minutes after the start of the fire plan. The data to the left is to be fired for the first 9 minutes of the fire plan. In this case, it looks like the commander simply wrote a “9” to the left to help better see the duration of fire for his battery at this target.

“Klarzeit” is the time the fire plan begins and then goes in set intervals of "x+minutes". This looks like the fire plan began at 0110 hours; this is “x”.

The next set of numbers - “2845” - is range to the target. This would then be converted to the elevation for the gun to adjust; this would come from a published firing table specific to the gun. Since this Schießtafel applies to various calibers of guns, this figure does not appear.

(Actually, 2845 meters doesn't seem all that far for heavy artillery to be away from the target. Of course, the max effective range for the 15cm schwere Feld Haubitze - the gun that this table is likely for - was 8600 meters.)

Artillery fire is effected by weather conditions; a shell flying through the air can be put off course or land short or beyond the target due to weather. So, range is adjusted for Wittungseinfluss (W.E.). I read in the order that the Wetterdienst sends this out by Fernspruch daily; in this case, it doesn't look like the weather had any effect since the range did not change. (Probably was not raining or foggy.)

There is also a remark for “Erhoeung in Grad” - this would be the elevation of the target; however, they didn't make a remark for this; so, the target area was most likely not a hill.

The commander did make a note for “Glw.” - “Gelaendewinkel” - this is a factor that in English we call “site”. This is a factor that considers that the target is at a different elevation than the location of the guns (even though they didn't make a note of the target's elevation.) This is the "-3" and would be applied to the elevation set on the gun.

The “+120” is the direction of fire in degrees. This would be the azimuth of fire set on the gun. (Surprising they used degrees instead of mils.)

The “Wie oft 1 Schuss” tells how often each type of gun listed should fire one round. The blue number to the right under the “Mun.” column is “8” or “9” - this looks like the total number of rounds to be fired for this target. That means this table was prepared for the s.F.H. (schwere Feld Haubitze) because the s.F.H. Should fire one shell every 1 minute 10 seconds. In 9 minutes they should be only able to shoot 7.7 shells; it looks like they rounded up to “8”. I cannot read the hand-writing to figure out why “9”.

This continues for the other targets at the other “x+ times”. Do you see in the 90 minutes fire time, the commander crossed out the round per minute factor for the s.F.H. Making a new time for each shell. This also suggests this was made for the 15cm s.F.H.

Only things that I do not quite understand are: "Stellungsziel" and "Artl.Ziel" on the left side. In the computations these are very different ranges. Maybe the Stellungsziel is shooting at the positions in the trenches since it is a shorter range (2845). And the Artl. Ziel is counter-battery fire against the enemies artillery - at a greater range (6300).

I also do not know the difference of the "blau" gruen" and "splitter" munitions; types of shells, but how they are different, I do not know.

[IrishGunner]

Andreas sent me this in an email before he went to bed...

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Quote Andreas:

That are one of my problems too. Stellungs-Ziel and Artillerie-Ziel. If we look at the times , we see x+85-x+174 at the Stellungs-Ziel and x+175-x+189 at Artillerie-Ziel. Maybe these are targets, whose should be shot directly?

The amunitions. Splitter means splinter (I think), like a shrapnell. I think the different colours seemed to be gas grenades.

The 15cm s.F.H. could shoot "Grünkreuz", "Blaukreuz" and "Gelbkreuz"

There were

1 green cross (3,9l Diphosgen)

1 green cross varaiation (3,9l Diphosgen, Brommethylethylketon)

1 green cross varaiation (3,9l Brommethylethylketon)

1 green cross varaiation (3,9l Phenylcarbylaminchlorid)

1 green cross (Grünkeuz 1): 30-70% Diphosgen, 70-30% Chlorpikrin

2 green crosses (Grünkreuz 2, Grünkreuz-Brisanz): 3,2l 60% Phosgen, 28% Diphosgen, 12% Diphenylarsinchlorid, 0,187kg TNT

1 blue cross (Blaukreuz-Brisanz) 1,35kg Diphenylarsinchlorid in 3,47kg TNT

1 or 2 blue crosses (Blaukreuz 1) Diphenylarsinchlorid mixed with Phenylarsinchlorid)

[The Prussian]

Hi IG!
I know, I thanked you personally for your help four years ago...

I don´t want to make this thread forgetable, so I´ll enclose a map of july, 15th 1918. The map of the Feuerwalze should cover the area behind the 1st division.

Intersteing for me is, that my grandpa was injured by gas in september 1918 near St.Souplet (in the middle of the map)

Edited March 16, 2014 by The Prussian