Big guns and tracks to the trenches

Artillery has been at the heart of modern warfare. Indeed, if the vast catapults of Roman times and the throwing spears, arrows etc of ancient time are included, artillery has always been important. France of the 1850s and 60s thrilled to stories of big guns. The young Prosper Péchot idolised his uncle who went out to free Italy from the yoke of the Hapsburg oppressor. At the battle of Solferino, the French Army under Emperor Napoleon 111 hammered the Austrians at a safe distance, thanks to their modern guns. A panorama showing the guns was painted and put on exhibition, to the delight of vast numbers of the patriotic French.

Sketch of the battle of Solferino 1859 from a painting by Meissonier. Copyright MD Wright

It is easy to imagine a young Péchot deciding to become an officer in the Artillery on the strength of this victory. Before he could join up, he had to win a place at the prestigious Ecole Polytechnique. This involved two years at a junior university before he could even sit the competitive entrance exam, but he managed all this and in 1870 was a student there, sponsored by the Army.

‘Bigger, better, faster, longer’ was the slogan where artillery concerned. Unfortunately, the French took on Prussia in 1870. Undoubtedly their new rifles were superior to the Prussian offer and there were many German casualties. The Prussians, however, had superior guns. There were also other factors in the French defeat. Too many of their trained army were pinned in frontier fortresses or interned in Switzerland. Enthusiastic citizen armies were no match for the well-drilled Prussians who always popped up in the right place at the right time – the most inconvenient place at the most inconvenient time from the French point of view.

Prosper Pechot in 1909. Courtesy of Raymond PECHOT

There were many lessons learned from the humiliating defeat followed by the loss of Alsace Lorraine. Bigger and better artillery was one, bigger and better forts another.

For years after, standard exercises at officer training were re-runs of the 1870-71 war. In 1882, Prosper Péchot, now in training as a staff officer, was set a problem: How should he recapture the city of Metz from the Germans? (Metz was one of the prizes that were awarded to the Germans in the peace of 1871.P Péchot‘s response was non-standard, and made history.

The standard Prussian gun used in 1870-1 used 4 kg shells. The Germans had difficulty in transporting sufficient of these comparatively small shells to their gun batteries. By 1914, their mortars could be firing shells of 40 kg. An efficient means of transporting shells was needed. Copyright MD Wright

He realised that the only practicable way to bring the big guns within range of the enemy was to bring them up on temporary railways. There were already examples of this technology. The Decauville Company had been marketing portable track since 1876s. By the late 1870s, they were in use on military bases.

In 1880, Paul Decauville, thought of using his portable track for transporting guns and ammunition in the field. Until then, such track was considered only suitable for light little wagons, and stacks of shelves, for smallish loads of gravel, earth or agricultural produce. It was unsuitable for large loads; worse still, using a horse to pull the wagons along tended to wear away the margins so that bit by bit the rail was dislodged. Thus when Decauville track was used on campaign in Tunisia, it attracted much criticism.

The genius of Péchot was to design away every difficulty. Track and axles were the first part of his problem-solving approach. He determined that 60cm gauge (0m60 as he preferred to call it) was the best compromise between standard gauge which gave stability and speed and very narrow gauge which could be easily laid.

He then improved the track. Existing Decauville track could best be described as metal ladders, quickly laid, quickly taken up, but quickly mauled. Péchot devised the track anew. Not only was there a heavier weight of rail and more sleepers per prefabricated length, but each of these sleepers extended well beyond the rail and was cleverly designed to keep the ballast under it. By careful use of theory and practice he made sure that each 5m length could be carried without strain by four men. His Memorandum of 1882 is accompanied by a sketch of his new design.

Pechot's 1882 Memorandum to the Minister. Big guns need new technology. Courtesy Raymond PECHOT

Péchot also found the way to carry hitherto unimaginable loads on this light portable track. Okay, each wagon axle could safely carry a maximum of 3.5 tonnes (itself quite an advance) but what about having lots of axles under each wagon? This could double, quadruple yea, dodecatuple the load that could be carried.

This technology was very new, but in 1882, Péchot was already designing improved bogie wagons. He realised that the axles had to be joined with efficient springing and made advances there. To accompany his Memorandum, he provided a sketch of a 270mm gun being carried on a portable railway.

Horses and oxen wore away the tow-path. The more effort a beast of burden put into pulling a wagon forward, the more it scraped away the path – simple physics. Once the tow-path was eroded, the entire railway started tipping into the hole thus created. Don’t blame Isaac Newton for his Second Law of motion – that’s like shooting the messenger! Once the tow-path was eroded, the entire railway started slipping into the hole. The worse the hole, the more the poor beasts had to pull and the more they eroded the tow-path. 

Péchot was not the first to solve the problem. If the prime mover was itself using the track, then the forces were resolved into the track in relative safety. He was the first to insist on locomotives being the rule not the exception. His Memorandum of 1882 shows a 5-tonne Decauville locomotive equipped with steam capstan hauling the gun.

The standard Pechot system well-wagon, manufactured 1888 and in use until after the Second World War. This was photographed outside the Maginot fort of Fermont by SM Wright

After a struggle ending with convulsions in the French Army, the Péchot system was officially adopted. feldbahn. The Brigadewagen was similar to the standard Péchot wagon, both in having bogies and in overall length.

Wrightscale 16mm model of a Pechot well-wagon

Interestingly, the French Navy used it to best effect. This was in 1888. That very year, the German Army stopped its flirtation with other gauges and settled on 60 cm for its own

 When designs for Mallet and then Péchot-Bourdon locomotives appeared, the Germans ditched their Hohenzollern locomotives and started producing ones of similar appearance and weight. The Germans also kept improving the designs and so by 1914, they had benefited from over 25 years of R&D.

French 155 Long gun as used in 1914-18. Photographed at Verdun by SM Wright

The French kept to the old-fashioned idea of long-barrelled guns and their field railways were adapted to transport them. The Germans standardised on mortars. These could more easily be moved by horses or a team of men. Their wagons was used for ammunition and all the other stores. The Brigadewagen, though an admirable design in many ways, was therefore lighter and less durable than the French (and later the British WD bogie wagons). There are few survivors.

The German 105mm mortar was less of a brute to transport but it was of high calibre and generally able to inflict a lot of damage  on the trenches of the enemy. Photographed at Verdun by SM Wright

The Péchot well-wagon is so sturdy that numerous examples survive. It was, however rather over-engineered. In 1915, the French Army introduced the ‘Decauville 15’ a somewhat lighter wagon but produced in thousands.

A ‘Tracks To The Trenches’ event is coming up at the Apedale Railway. Among many other goodies, there should be an example of the Péchot well-wagon and of the ‘Decauville 15’ Catch it 13th to 15th July.

For the full story of the Péchot Memorandum of 1882, see Chapter 111 of ‘Colonel Péchot: Tracks To The Trenches’ Birse Press.

The Decauville 15 platform wagon did not have the handy well of the Pechot wagon but it was easier to manufacture. This survivor was photographer in the museum at Verdun by SM Wright

Data Protection A Reminder

Customer information is held off-line but if you email us, your e-address does go into our e-address book. If you have emailed us but you wish it removed, please tell us.

Wrightscale and Data Protection

Wrightscale and the new General Data Protection Regulation. 

GDPR came into effect on May 25^th. It applies to any organisation which sells goods and services to individuals living in the EU. You may ask why we aren’t bombarding you with emails on the topic.

The Wrightscale 16mm scale live steam Wren locomotive is one of our best-selling products

GDPR affects traders from all around the world; the new legislation has proved profitable to various advisers eg accountancy firms and other consultancies. They have hyped up the threat – a maximum fine of 20m euros or 4 % of annual turnover. In the USA alone the largest 500 companies have spent nearly $8 billion in making sure that they can continue to trade within the EU. Apparently, consultants were able to double their rates monthly as the deadline of May 25^th approached.

This  live steam Wren locomotive explains the nature of our business

Small companies like ours have been worried by the new legislation. It is hard to know where to turn for advice. The UK Government itself has been less than clear. A professional analyst said that advice from the UK Information Commissioner’s Office was ‘not easy to understand’. He was a pro so the average amateur is even less likely to understand what our own government has to say on the issue. No doubt there will have to be a case in court before everything is completely clear.

The upshot has been that organisations large and small have been emailing or writing to clients. My inbox is full of emails from companies, organisations and charities all begging me for permissions to keep sending their ‘updates’ – organisation-speak for advertising. Some offer inducements as well as heartfelt pleas. There is emotive language ‘We love you… don’t lose us for ever’ There is wit. A well-known snack food retailer offers ‘a pizza my heart.’ There are inducements such as £10 off the next order. Be afraid when they offer gifts. Anything you buy will be more than £10, so what seems like a concern for your privacy turns out to be just another marketing gimmick. For the most part, there’s no need to answer. This ‘marketing’ will probably continue anyway. If a site, or an e-tailer is sufficiently interesting, you will find your way back to them.

16mm Wrightscale Wren running on a garden railway. Rather than targeted advertising, we would rather you came to look at our products

We decided against pestering you. We feel that you our customers should be allowed to search for what you want. We have carefully reviewed our business practices which already respect your privacy and right to a clear inbox. Our mailings are in response to yours or to give you information that you specifically requested. Your email addresses appear without distinguishing marks in our ‘contacts’ list. You can request us to delete them. We made a conscious decision not to clutter customer’s inboxes with ‘newsflashes’.

By asking ‘regulars’ for consent, small businesses may even have made some of their mailings illegal. About two thirds of customers do not respond to ‘privacy policy’ emails. If people think ‘dull, unimportant or whoops! I hit the wrong button!’ can you blame them? Technically, all these failures to reply mean that this 66%  of all customers should be deleted from the typical e-tailer’s list. If they are not, then in theory the organisation is breaking the law. If the e-tailer had just kept quiet, all would have been well.

If you have hours to spare and like raised blood pressure, you can read through all the ‘re-subscribe’ emails. You may even start to feel sorry for the smaller e-tailers and publishers. Advice that these organisations receive is of varying quality.

There is a feeling that large well-funded companies will ignore the rules. To be more accurate, they can find accommodations with the new realities and find ways to suck us back on to their mailing lists. GDPR may give us more power to block unwanted communications, but this right is incomplete. ‘Service communications’ do not count as marketing, nor do mailings and phone messages about services if they can argue that the victim whoops, sorry, customer has a legitimate interest in such information. Thus although 25^th May has come and gone, recorded messages still tell us that we might be eligible for free home insulation. It is business as usual for some marketeers.

This is a genuine historic Wren locomotive at work on the Leighton Buzzard LIne. We are proud to offer history to our public. Photo copyright MD Wright

There is evidence that larger organisations are exploiting smaller ones. A certain Web platform, whose information harvesting tools are used to price, sell and place adverts has informed its users that data protection compliance is their responsibility. The Web platform can continue to use the data that has been harvested. In theory, the fines for the small blogger might be massive.

The key word is ‘might’. The one certain thing is that it has cost many people with a Web presence good money to avoid a conceivable prosecution. We have to remember that the massive fines for bad practice are potential rather than a certainty. At the very worst, a small company with a small turnover will be charged ‘in proportion’ ie enough to hurt but nothing like 20m euros.

We must not seem ungrateful. This large Web platform has enabled us to blog, conveniently both for you and for us. We can share with you the news from Malcolm’s work-bench and our historical research. It comes from us to you in a convenient way. We don’t carry paid advertising for other products. We are pleased that you are interested in what we write. We don’t hold data on our readers any more than we do about our customers.

Part of Wrightscale WD bogie kit made up. It is a faithful 16mm model of the bogies that were used in their thousands to carry food, water, ammunition and supplies to the British Army on the Western Front 1916-18

Although it is disappointing that telemarketing and spam have not disappeared, there are some good things about GDPR. One is that small organisations acting in good faith probably won’t suffer. Another is that it is (in theory) illegal to hold data without informing the customer about this hitherto clandestine data bank.

Fine 16mm models of WD wagons made by Henry Holdsworth. They run on Wrightscale WD bogies as seen above. Photo copyright Jim Hawkesworth

This aspect of the new legislation affects, for example, the data on which robots base insurance quotations or loan decisions. Someone who is considered ‘a bad risk’ for insurance purposes can at least discuss special circumstances with a human being. We have all heard stories about elderly relatives who keeps claiming on the insurance for home repairs.They may think that the repairs are ‘free’ but the insurance just reclaims the cash by quietly raising the premiums paid by direct debit. Loving family take her affairs under control and fix the roof or the intrusive tree roots so that the damage and thus the claims will cease, but no other insurer will take on the house. Scandalous premiums must continue to be paid, even though the problem is fixed. Now at least, loving family can discuss it with a human being and interest another insurer enough to quote a more reasonable sum.

Colonel Prosper Pechot. Thanks to him, 60cm/2' gauge became widely used.  We use the blog and our biography to make his name better known. Photo courtesy Raymond PECHOT

  Wrightscale tries to keep down its costs and so we haven’t paid out to consultants – yet. We feel that this is what our customers prefer. The companies with most to fear from GDPR legislation are the ones who take customer data for their own uses.. The Wrightscale presence on the internet tries to go the other way. Our website and blog exist to give you information, not the other way around.  GDPR at its best exists to foster this shift in power between people/customers and organisations.

Remember, if you wish us to remove your email address from your mailing list, please tell us. Have a nice day, folks.