![Shrapnel shell](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/31/Shrapnel_shell.gif)
Shrapnel shells were
anti-personnel artillery munitions which carried many individual
bullet
A bullet is a kinetic projectile, a component of firearm ammunition that is shot from a gun barrel. Bullets are made of a variety of materials, such as copper, lead, steel, polymer, rubber and even wax. Bullets are made in various shapes and co ...
s close to a target area and then ejected them to allow them to continue along the shell's trajectory and strike targets individually. They relied almost entirely on the shell's velocity for their lethality. The munition has been obsolete since the end of
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
for anti-personnel use;
high-explosive shells superseded it for that role. The functioning and principles behind Shrapnel shells are fundamentally different from high-explosive shell fragmentation. Shrapnel is named after Lieutenant-General
Henry Shrapnel
Lieutenant General Henry Shrapnel (3 June 1761 – 13 March 1842) was a British Army officer whose name has entered the English language as the inventor of the shrapnel shell.
Henry Shrapnel was born at Midway Manor in Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltsh ...
(1761–1842), a
British
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
artillery
Artillery is a class of heavy military ranged weapons that launch munitions far beyond the range and power of infantry firearms. Early artillery development focused on the ability to breach defensive walls and fortifications during siege ...
officer, whose
experiment
An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into Causality, cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome oc ...
s, initially conducted on his own time and at his own expense, culminated in the
design
A design is a plan or specification for the construction of an object or system or for the implementation of an activity or process or the result of that plan or specification in the form of a prototype, product, or process. The verb ''to design'' ...
and development of a new type of
artillery shell.
Usage of term "shrapnel" has changed over time to also refer to
fragmentation of the casing of shells and bombs. This is its most common modern usage, which strays from the original meaning.
[
]
Development
![12-pdrShrapnel](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/46/12-pdrShrapnel.jpg)
In 1784, Lieutenant Shrapnel of the
Royal Artillery
The Royal Regiment of Artillery, commonly referred to as the Royal Artillery (RA) and colloquially known as "The Gunners", is one of two regiments that make up the artillery arm of the British Army. The Royal Regiment of Artillery comprises t ...
began developing an
anti-personnel weapon
An anti-personnel weapon is a weapon primarily used to maim or kill infantry and other personnel not behind armor, as opposed to attacking structures or vehicles, or hunting game. The development of defensive fortification and combat vehicles ga ...
. At the time artillery could use "
canister shot
Canister shot is a kind of anti-personnel artillery ammunition. Canister shot has been used since the advent of gunpowder-firing artillery in Western armies. However, canister shot saw particularly frequent use on land and at sea in the various ...
" to defend themselves from
infantry
Infantry is a military specialization which engages in ground combat on foot. Infantry generally consists of light infantry, mountain infantry, motorized infantry & mechanized infantry, airborne infantry, air assault infantry, and marine i ...
or
cavalry
Historically, cavalry (from the French word ''cavalerie'', itself derived from "cheval" meaning "horse") are soldiers or warriors who fight mounted on horseback. Cavalry were the most mobile of the combat arms, operating as light cavalry ...
attack, which involved loading a tin or canvas container filled with small iron or lead balls instead of the usual
cannonball
A round shot (also called solid shot or simply ball) is a solid spherical projectile without explosive charge, launched from a gun. Its diameter is slightly less than the bore of the barrel from which it is shot. A round shot fired from a lar ...
. When fired, the container burst open during passage through the bore or at the muzzle, giving the effect of an oversized
shotgun shell
A shotgun shell, shotshell or simply shell is a type of rimmed, cylindrical (straight-walled) cartridges used specifically in shotguns, and is typically loaded with numerous small, pellet-like spherical sub- projectiles called shot, fired thro ...
. At ranges of up to 300 m canister shot was still highly lethal, though at this range the shots’ density was much lower, making a hit on a human body less likely. At longer ranges, solid shot or the common shell—a hollow cast-iron sphere filled with
black powder
Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate (saltpeter). Th ...
—was used, although with more of a concussive than a fragmentation effect, as the pieces of the shell were very large and sparse in number.
Shrapnel's innovation was to combine the multi-projectile shotgun effect of canister shot, with a
time fuze to open the canister and disperse the bullets it contained at some distance along the canister's trajectory from the gun. His shell was a hollow cast-iron sphere filled with a mixture of balls and powder, with a crude time fuze. If the fuze was set correctly then the shell would break open, either in front of or above the intended human objective, releasing its contents (of
musket
A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually d ...
balls). The shrapnel balls would carry on with the "remaining velocity" of the shell. In addition to a denser pattern of musket balls, the retained velocity could be higher as well, since the shrapnel shell as a whole would likely have a higher
ballistic coefficient
In ballistics, the ballistic coefficient (BC, ''C'') of a body is a measure of its ability to overcome air resistance in flight. It is inversely proportional to the negative acceleration: a high number indicates a low negative acceleration—the ...
than the individual musket balls (see
external ballistics
External ballistics or exterior ballistics is the part of ballistics that deals with the behavior of a projectile in flight. The projectile may be powered or un-powered, guided or unguided, spin or fin stabilized, flying through an atmosphere or ...
).
The explosive charge in the shell was to be just enough to break the casing rather than scatter the shot in all directions. As such his invention increased the effective range of canister shot from to about .
He called his device 'spherical case shot', but in time it came to be called after him; a nomenclature formalised in 1852 by the British Government.
Initial designs suffered from the potentially catastrophic problem that friction between the shot and black powder during the high acceleration down the gun bore could sometimes cause premature ignition of the powder. Various solutions were tried, with limited if any success. However, in 1852
Colonel Boxer proposed using a diaphragm to separate the bullets from the
bursting charge
In fireworks, a burst charge (usually black powder) is a pyrotechnic mixture placed in a shell which is ignited when the shell reaches the desired height in order to create an explosion and spread the stars. Burst charge compositions are usually ...
; this proved successful and was adopted the following year. As a buffer to prevent lead shot deforming, a resin was used as a packing material between the shot. A useful side effect of using the resin was that the combustion also gave a visual reference upon the shell bursting, as the resin shattered into a cloud of dust.
British artillery adoption
![BL 5 inch shrapnel shells Mk III & Mk IV diagrams](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8e/BL_5_inch_shrapnel_shells_Mk_III_%26_Mk_IV_diagrams.jpg)
It took until 1803 for the British artillery to adopt (albeit with great enthusiasm) the shrapnel shell (as "spherical case").
Henry Shrapnel
Lieutenant General Henry Shrapnel (3 June 1761 – 13 March 1842) was a British Army officer whose name has entered the English language as the inventor of the shrapnel shell.
Henry Shrapnel was born at Midway Manor in Bradford-on-Avon, Wiltsh ...
was promoted to
major
Major (commandant in certain jurisdictions) is a military rank of commissioned officer status, with corresponding ranks existing in many military forces throughout the world. When used unhyphenated and in conjunction with no other indicators ...
in the same year. The first recorded use of shrapnel by the British was in 1804 against the Dutch at
Fort Nieuw-Amsterdam in
Suriname
Suriname (; srn, Sranankondre or ), officially the Republic of Suriname ( nl, Republiek Suriname , srn, Ripolik fu Sranan), is a country on the northeastern Atlantic coast of South America. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the north ...
.
The Duke of Wellington
Arthur Wellesley, 1st Duke of Wellington, (1 May 1769 – 14 September 1852) was an Anglo-Irish soldier and Tory statesman who was one of the leading military and political figures of 19th-century Britain, serving twice as prime minister of ...
's armies used it from 1808 in the
Peninsular War
The Peninsular War (1807–1814) was the military conflict fought in the Iberian Peninsula by Spain, Portugal, and the United Kingdom against the invading and occupying forces of the First French Empire during the Napoleonic Wars. In Spain ...
and at the
Battle of Waterloo
The Battle of Waterloo was fought on Sunday 18 June 1815, near Waterloo, Belgium, Waterloo (at that time in the United Kingdom of the Netherlands, now in Belgium). A French army under the command of Napoleon was defeated by two of the armie ...
, and he wrote admiringly of its effectiveness.
The design was improved by Captain
E. M. Boxer of the
Royal Arsenal around 1852 and crossed over when cylindrical shells for rifled guns were introduced. Lieutenant-Colonel Boxer adapted his design in 1864 to produce shrapnel shells for the new
rifled muzzle-loader A rifled muzzle loader in the forecastle of HMS Gannet (1878) ">HMS_Gannet_(1878).html" ;"title="forecastle of HMS Gannet (1878)">forecastle of HMS Gannet (1878)
A rifled muzzle loader (RML) is a type of large artillery piece invented in the mid ...
(
RML) guns: the walls were of thick
cast iron
Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...
, but the gunpowder charge was now in the shell base with a tube running through the centre of the shell to convey the ignition flash from the
time fuze in the nose to the gunpowder charge in the base. The powder charge both shattered the cast iron shell wall and liberated the bullets.
[ The broken shell wall continued mainly forward but had little destructive effect. The system had major limitations: the thickness of the iron shell walls limited the available carrying capacity for bullets but provided little destructive capability, and the tube through the centre similarly reduced available space for bullets.]["]Treatise on Ammunition
''Treatise on Ammunition'', from 1926 retitled ''Text Book of Ammunition'', is a series of manuals detailing all British Empire military and naval service ammunition and associated equipment in use at the date of publication. It was published by ...
", 4th Edition 1887, pp. 203-205.
In the 1870s William Armstrong provided a design with the bursting charge in the head and the shell wall made of steel and hence much thinner than previous cast-iron shrapnel shell walls. While the thinner shell wall and absence of a central tube allowed the shell to carry far more bullets, it had the disadvantage that the bursting charge separated the bullets from the shell casing by firing the case forward and at the same time slowing the bullets down as they were ejected through the base of the shell casing, rather than increasing their velocity. Britain adopted this solution for several smaller calibres (below 6-inch)[ but by ]World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
few if any such shells remained.
The final shrapnel shell design, adopted in the 1880s, bore little similarity to Henry Shrapnel's original design other than its spherical bullets and time fuse. It used a much thinner forged steel shell case with a timer fuse in the nose and a tube running through the centre to convey the ignition flash to a gunpowder bursting charge in the shell base. The use of steel allowed a thinner shell wall, allowing space for many more bullets. It also withstood the force of the powder charge without shattering, so that the bullets were fired forward out of the shell case with increased velocity, much like a shotgun. This design came to be adopted by all countries and was in standard use when World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
began in 1914. During the 1880s, when both the old cast-iron and modern forged-steel shrapnel shell designs were in British service, British ordnance manuals referred to the older cast-iron design as "Boxer shrapnel", apparently to differentiate it from the modern steel design.["The action of Boxer-shrapnel is well known. The fuze fires the primer, which conveys the flash down the pipe to the bursting charge, the explosion of which breaks up the shell, and liberates the balls". ]Treatise on Ammunition
''Treatise on Ammunition'', from 1926 retitled ''Text Book of Ammunition'', is a series of manuals detailing all British Empire military and naval service ammunition and associated equipment in use at the date of publication. It was published by ...
1887, p. 216.
The modern thin-walled forged-steel design made feasible shrapnel shells for howitzers, which had a much lower velocity than field guns, by using a larger gunpowder charge to accelerate the bullets forward on bursting.Treatise on Ammunition
''Treatise on Ammunition'', from 1926 retitled ''Text Book of Ammunition'', is a series of manuals detailing all British Empire military and naval service ammunition and associated equipment in use at the date of publication. It was published by ...
1887, p. 205. The ideal shrapnel design would have had a timer fuze in the shell base to avoid the need for a central tube, but this was not technically feasible due to the need to manually adjust the fuze before firing, and was in any case rejected from an early date by the British due to risk of premature ignition and irregular action.
World War I era
Technical considerations
The size of shrapnel balls in World War I was based on two considerations. One was the premise that a projectile energy of about was required to disable an enemy soldier. A typical World War I field gun shell at its maximum possible range traveling at a velocity of 250 feet/second, plus the additional velocity from the shrapnel bursting charge (about 150 feet per second), would give individual shrapnel bullets a velocity of 400 feet per second and an energy of 60 foot-pounds (81 joule
The joule ( , ; symbol: J) is the unit of energy in the International System of Units (SI). It is equal to the amount of work done when a force of 1 newton displaces a mass through a distance of 1 metre in the direction of the force applied ...
s): this was the minimum energy of a single half-inch lead-antimony
Antimony is a chemical element with the symbol Sb (from la, stibium) and atomic number 51. A lustrous gray metalloid, it is found in nature mainly as the sulfide mineral stibnite (Sb2S3). Antimony compounds have been known since ancient time ...
ball of approximately , or 41-42 balls = 1 pound.[Foot-pounds is calculated as wv²/2gc, where gc is the local acceleration of gravity, or 32.16 ft/second. Hence for the British calculation: 60 foot-pounds = 1/41 x v²/64.32 . Hence v² = 60 x 64.32 x 41 . Hence v = 398 feet/second] Hence this was a typical field gun shrapnel bullet size.
The maximum possible range, typically beyond , was beyond useful shrapnel combat ranges for normal field guns due to loss of accuracy and the fact that at extreme range the projectiles descended relatively steeply and hence the "cone" of bullets covered a relatively small area.
At a more typical combat range of , giving a fairly flat trajectory and hence a long " beaten zone" for the bullets, a typical 3-inch or 75-mm field gun shrapnel shell would have a velocity of approximately 900 feet/second. The bursting charge would add a possible 150 feet/second, giving a bullet velocity of 1,050 feet/second. This would give each bullet approximately 418 foot-pounds: seven times the assumed energy required to disable a man.
:
For larger guns which had lower velocities, correspondingly larger balls were used so that each individual ball carried enough energy to be lethal.
Most engagements using guns in this size range used direct fire at enemy from to distant, at which ranges the residual shell velocity was correspondingly higher, as in the table - at least in the earlier stages of World War 1.
The other factor was the trajectory. The shrapnel bullets were typically lethal for about from normal field guns after bursting and over from heavy field guns. To make maximum use of these distances a flat trajectory and hence high velocity gun was required. The pattern in Europe was that the armies with higher-velocity guns tended to use heavier bullets because they could afford to have fewer bullets per shell.
The important points to note about shrapnel shells and bullets in their final stage of development in World War I are:
*They used the property of carrying power, whereby if two projectiles are fired with the same velocity, then the heavier one goes farther. Bullets packed into a heavier carrier shell went farther than they would individually.
*The shell body itself was not designed to be lethal: its sole function was to transport the bullets close to the target, and it fell to the ground intact after the bullets were released. A battlefield where a shrapnel barrage had been fired was afterwards typically littered with intact empty shell bodies, fuzes and central tubes. Troops under a shrapnel barrage would attempt to convey any of these intact fuzes they found to their own artillery units, as the time setting on the fuze could be used to calculate the shell's range and hence identify the firing gun's position, allowing it to be targeted in a counter-barrage.
*They depended almost entirely on the shell's velocity for their lethality: there was no lateral explosive effect.
A firsthand description of successful British deployment of shrapnel in a defensive barrage during the Third Battle of Ypres
The Third Battle of Ypres (german: link=no, Dritte Flandernschlacht; french: link=no, Troisième Bataille des Flandres; nl, Derde Slag om Ieper), also known as the Battle of Passchendaele (), was a campaign of the First World War, fought by t ...
, 1917: ... the air is full of yellow spurts of smoke that burst about 30 feet up and shoot towards the earth - just ahead of each of these yellow puffs the earth rises in a lashed-up cloud - shrapnel - and how beautifully placed - long sweeps of it fly along that slope lashing up a good 200 yards of earth at each burst.
Tactical use
During the initial stages of World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, shrapnel was widely used by all sides as an anti-personnel weapon. It was the only type of shell available for British field guns (13-pounder
The Ordnance QF 13-pounder ( quick-firing) field gun was the standard equipment of the British and Canadian Royal Horse Artillery at the outbreak of World War I.
History
The QF 13-pounder was developed as a response to combat experience gained ...
, 15 pounder and 18-pounder) until October 1914. Shrapnel was effective against troops in the open, particularly massed infantry (advancing or withdrawing). However, the onset of trench warfare
Trench warfare is a type of land warfare using occupied lines largely comprising military trenches, in which troops are well-protected from the enemy's small arms fire and are substantially sheltered from artillery. Trench warfare became a ...
from late 1914 led to most armies decreasing their use of shrapnel in favour of high-explosive. Britain continued to use a high percentage of shrapnel shells. New tactical roles included cutting barbed wire and providing "creeping barrages" to both screen its own attacking troops and suppressing the enemy defenders to prevent them from shooting at their attackers.
In a creeping barrage fire was 'lifted' from one 'line' to the next as the attackers advanced. These lines were typically apart and the lifts were typically 4 minutes apart. Lifting meant that time fuzes settings had to be changed. The attackers tried to keep as close as possible (as little as 25 yards sometimes) to the bursting shrapnel so as to be on top of the enemy trenches when fire lifted beyond them, and before the enemy could get back to their parapets.
Advantages
While shrapnel made no impression on trenches and other earthworks, it remained the favoured weapon of the British (at least) to support their infantry assaults by suppressing the enemy infantry and preventing them from manning their trench parapets. This was called 'neutralization' and by the second half of 1915 had become the primary task of artillery supporting an attack. Shrapnel was less hazardous to the assaulting British infantry than high explosives - as long as their own shrapnel burst above or ahead of them, attackers were safe from its effects, whereas high-explosive shell
A shell, in a military context, is a projectile whose payload contains an explosive, incendiary, or other chemical filling. Originally it was called a bombshell, but "shell" has come to be unambiguous in a military context. Modern usage ...
s bursting short are potentially lethal within 100 yards or more in any direction. Shrapnel was also useful against counter-attacks, working parties and any other troops in the open.
British Expeditionary Force "GHQ Artillery Notes No. 5 Wire-cutting" was issued in June 1916. It prescribed the use of shrapnel for wirecutting, with HE used to scatter the posts and wire when cut. However, there were constraints: the best ranges for 18-pdrs were 1,800–2,400 yards. Shorter ranges meant the flat trajectories might not clear the firers' own parapets, and fuzes could not be set for less than 1,000 yards. The guns had to be overhauled by artificers and carefully calibrated. Furthermore, they needed good platforms with trail and wheels anchored with sandbags, and an observing officer had to monitor the effects on the wire continuously and make any necessary adjustments to range and fuze settings. These instructions were repeated in "GHQ Artillery Notes No. 3 Artillery in Offensive Operations", issued in February 1917 with added detail including the amount of ammunition required per yard of wire frontage. The use of shrapnel for wire-cutting was also highlighted in RA "Training Memoranda No. 2 1939".
Shrapnel provided a useful "screening" effect from the smoke of the black-powder bursting charges when the British used it in "creeping barrages".
Disadvantages
One of the key factors that contributed to the heavy casualties sustained by the British at the Battle of the Somme
The Battle of the Somme ( French: Bataille de la Somme), also known as the Somme offensive, was a battle of the First World War fought by the armies of the British Empire and French Third Republic against the German Empire. It took place bet ...
was the perceived belief that shrapnel would be effective at cutting the barbed wire
A close-up view of a barbed wire
Roll of modern agricultural barbed wire
Barbed wire, also known as barb wire, is a type of steel fencing wire constructed with sharp edges or points arranged at intervals along the strands. Its primary use is t ...
entanglements in no man's land
No man's land is waste or unowned land or an uninhabited or desolate area that may be under dispute between parties who leave it unoccupied out of fear or uncertainty. The term was originally used to define a contested territory or a dump ...
(although it has been suggested that the reason for the use of shrapnel as a wire-cutter at the Somme was because Britain lacked the capacity to manufacture enough HE shell). This perception was reinforced by the successful deployment of shrapnel shells against Germany's barbed wire entanglements in the 1915 Battle of Neuve Chapelle
The Battle of Neuve Chapelle (10–13 March 1915) took place in the First World War in the Artois region of France. The attack was intended to cause a rupture in the German lines, which would then be exploited with a rush to the Aubers Ridge a ...
, but the Germans thickened their barbed wire strands after that battle. As a result, shrapnel was later only effective in killing enemy personnel; even if the conditions were correct, with the angle of descent being flat to maximise the number of bullets going through the entanglements, the probability of a shrapnel ball hitting a thin line of barbed wire and successfully cutting it was extremely low. The bullets also had limited destructive effect and were stopped by sandbags, so troops behind protection or in bunkers were generally safe. Additionally, steel helmets, including both the German Stahlhelm and the British Brodie helmet
The Brodie helmet is a steel combat helmet designed and patented in London in 1915 by Latvian inventor John Leopold Brodie ( lv, Leopolds Janno Braude). A modified form of it became the Helmet, Steel, Mark I in Britain and the M1917 Helmet in ...
, could resist Shrapnel bullets and protect the wearer from head injury:
... suddenly, with a great clanging thud, I was hit on the forehead and knocked flying onto the floor of the trench... a shrapnel bullet had hit my helmet with great violence, without piercing it, but sufficiently hard to dent it. If I had, as had been usual up until a few days previously, been wearing a cap, then the Regiment would have had one more man killed.
A shrapnel shell was more expensive than a high-explosive one and required higher grade steel for the shell body. They were also harder to use correctly because getting the correct fuze running time was critical in order to burst the shell in the right place. This required considerable skill by the observation officer when engaging moving targets.
An added complication was that the actual fuze running time was affected by the meteorological conditions, with the variation in gun muzzle velocity being an added complication. However, the British used fuze indicators at each gun that determined the correct fuze running time (length) corrected for muzzle velocity.
Replacement by high-explosive shell
With the advent of relatively insensitive high explosives which could be used as the filling for shells, it was found that the casing of a properly designed high-explosive shell
A shell, in a military context, is a projectile whose payload contains an explosive, incendiary, or other chemical filling. Originally it was called a bombshell, but "shell" has come to be unambiguous in a military context. Modern usage ...
fragmented effectively . For example, the detonation of an average 105 mm shell produces several thousand high-velocity (1,000 to 1,500 m/s) fragments, a lethal (at very close range) blast overpressure and, if a surface or sub-surface burst, a useful cratering and anti-materiel effect — all in a munition much less complex than the later versions of the shrapnel shell. However, this fragmentation was often lost when shells penetrated soft ground, and because some fragments went in all directions it was a hazard to assaulting troops.
Variations
One item of note is the "universal shell", a type of field gun shell developed by Krupp
The Krupp family (see pronunciation), a prominent 400-year-old German dynasty from Essen, is notable for its production of steel, artillery, ammunition and other armaments. The family business, known as Friedrich Krupp AG (Friedrich Krup ...
of Germany in the early 1900s. This shell could function as either a shrapnel shell or high explosive projectile. The shell had a modified fuze, and, instead of resin as the packing between the shrapnel balls, TNT
Trinitrotoluene (), more commonly known as TNT, more specifically 2,4,6-trinitrotoluene, and by its preferred IUPAC name 2-methyl-1,3,5-trinitrobenzene, is a chemical compound with the formula C6H2(NO2)3CH3. TNT is occasionally used as a reagen ...
was used. When a timed fuze was set the shell functioned as a shrapnel round, ejecting the balls and igniting (not detonating) the TNT, giving a visible puff of black smoke. When allowed to impact, the TNT filling would detonate, becoming a high-explosive shell with a very large amount of low-velocity fragmentation and a milder blast. Due to its complexity it was dropped in favour of a simple high-explosive shell.
During World War I the UK also used shrapnel pattern shells to carry "pots" instead of "bullets". These were incendiary shells with seven pots using a thermite
Thermite () is a pyrotechnic composition of metal powder and metal oxide. When ignited by heat or chemical reaction, thermite undergoes an exothermic reduction-oxidation (redox) reaction. Most varieties are not explosive, but can create brie ...
compound.
When World War I began the United States also had what it referred to as the "Ehrhardt high-explosive shrapnel" in its inventory. It appears to be similar to the German design, with bullets embedded in TNT rather than resin, together with a quantity of explosive in the shell nose. Douglas Hamilton mentions this shell type in passing, as "not as common as other types" in his comprehensive treatises on manufacturing shrapnel and high explosive shells of 1915 and 1916, but gives no manufacturing details. Nor does Ethan Viall in 1917. Hence the US appears to have ceased its manufacture early in the war, presumably based on the experience of other combatants.
World War II era
A new British streamlined shrapnel shell, Mk 3D, had been developed for BL 60 pounder gun
The Ordnance BL 60-pounder was a British 5 inch (127 mm) heavy field gun designed in 1903–05 to provide a new capability that had been partially met by the interim QF 4.7 inch Gun. It was designed for both horse draft and mechanical ...
in the early 1930s, containing 760 bullets. There was some use of shrapnel by the British in the campaigns in East and North East Africa at the beginning of the war, where 18-pdr and 4.5-in (114 mm) howitzers were used. By World War II
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
shrapnel shells, in the strict sense of the word, fell out of use, the last recorded use of shrapnel being 60 pdr shells fired in Burma
Myanmar, ; UK pronunciations: US pronunciations incl. . Note: Wikipedia's IPA conventions require indicating /r/ even in British English although only some British English speakers pronounce r at the end of syllables. As John Wells explai ...
in 1943. In 1945 the British conducted successful trials with shrapnel shells fuzed with VT. However, shrapnel was not developed as munitions for any new British artillery models after World War I.
Vietnam War era
Although not strictly shrapnel, a 1960s weapons project produced splintex shells for 90 and 106 mm recoilless rifles and 105 mm howitzer
A howitzer () is a long- ranged weapon, falling between a cannon (also known as an artillery gun in the United States), which fires shells at flat trajectories, and a mortar, which fires at high angles of ascent and descent. Howitzers, like ot ...
s where it was called a "beehive
A beehive is an enclosed structure in which some honey bee species of the subgenus '' Apis'' live and raise their young. Though the word ''beehive'' is commonly used to describe the nest of any bee colony, scientific and professional literature ...
" round. Unlike the shrapnel shells’ balls, the splintex shells contained flechettes. The result was the 105 mm M546 APERS-T (anti-personnel-tracer) round, first used in the Vietnam War
The Vietnam War (also known by #Names, other names) was a conflict in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1 November 1955 to the fall of Saigon on 30 April 1975. It was the second of the Indochina Wars and was officially fought between North Vie ...
in 1966. The shell consisted of approximately 8,000 one-half gram flechettes arranged in five tiers, a time fuze, body shearing detonators, a central flash tube, a smokeless propellant charge with a dye marker contained in the base and a tracer element. The shell functioned as follows: the time fuze fired, the flash traveled down the flash tube, the shearing detonators fired, and the forward body split into four pieces. The body and first four tiers were dispersed by the projectile's spin, the last tier and visual marker by the powder charge itself. The flechettes spread, mainly due to spin, from the point of burst in an ever-widening cone along the projectile's previous trajectory prior to bursting. The round was complex to make, but is a highly effective anti-personnel weapon — soldiers reported that after beehive rounds were fired during an overrun attack, many enemy dead had their hands nailed to the wooden stocks of their rifles, and these dead could be dragged to mass graves by the rifle. It is said that the name beehive was given to the munition type due to the noise of the flechettes moving through the air resembling that of a swarm of bees.
Modern era
Though shrapnel rounds are now rarely used, apart from the beehive munitions, there are other modern rounds, that use, or have used, the shrapnel principle. The DM 111 20 mm cannon round used for close range air defense, the flechette-filled 40 mm HVCC (40 x 53 mm HV grenade), the 35 mm cannon (35 × 228 mm) AHEAD ammunition (152 x 3.3 g tungsten cylinders), RWM Schweiz 30 × 173 mm air-bursting munition, five-inch (127 mm) shotgun projectile (KE-ET) and possibly more. Also, many modern armies have canister shot ammunition for tank and artillery guns, the XM1028 round for the 120 mm M256 tank gun being one example (approx 1150 tungsten balls at 1,400 m/s).
At least some anti-ballistic missile
An anti-ballistic missile (ABM) is a surface-to-air missile designed to counter ballistic missiles (missile defense). Ballistic missiles are used to deliver nuclear weapon, nuclear, Chemical weapon, chemical, Bioagent, biological, or conventiona ...
s (ABMs) use shrapnel-like warheads instead of the more common blast-fragmentation types. As with a blast-frag warhead, the use of this type of warhead does not require a direct body-on-body impact, so greatly reduces tracking and steering accuracy requirements. At a predetermined distance from the incoming re-entry vehicle
Atmospheric entry is the movement of an object from outer space into and through the gases of an atmosphere of a planet, dwarf planet, or natural satellite. There are two main types of atmospheric entry: ''uncontrolled entry'', such as the entr ...
(RV) the warhead releases, in the case of the ABM warhead by an explosive expulsion charge, an array of mainly rod-like sub-projectiles into the RV's flight path. Unlike a blast-frag warhead, the expulsion charge is only needed to release the sub-projectiles from the main warhead, not to accelerate them to high velocity. The velocity required to penetrate the RV's casing comes from the high terminal velocity of the warhead, similar to the shrapnel shell's principle. The reason for the use of this type of warhead and not a blast-frag is that the fragments produced by a blast-frag warhead cannot guarantee penetration of the RV's casing. By using rod-like sub-projectiles, a much greater thickness of material can be penetrated, greatly increasing the potential for disruption of the incoming RV.
The Starstreak missile
Starstreak is a British short-range surface to air missile that can be used as a man-portable air-defence system (MANPADS) or in heavier systems, manufactured by Thales Air Defence (formerly Shorts Missile Systems), in Belfast, Northern Ireland. I ...
uses a similar system, with three metal darts splitting from the missile prior to impact, although in the case of Starstreak these darts are guided and contain an explosive charge.
Gallery of images
File:USRussianGermanFrenchBritShrapnelShells.jpg, US, Russian, German, French & British WWI Shrapnel rounds compared
File:18pdrShrapnelDiagram1.jpg, British 18-pounder shrapnel shell, WWI
File:Bille Shrapnel surface et profondeur Verdun.jpg, Shrapnel ball from WWI recovered at Verdun
Verdun (, , , ; official name before 1970 ''Verdun-sur-Meuse'') is a large city in the Meuse department in Grand Est, northeastern France. It is an arrondissement of the department.
Verdun is the biggest city in Meuse, although the capital ...
File:Empty shells Sanctuary Wood Museum Flickr 5086309295 73cff176d9 o.jpg, Empty fired shrapnel shells at Sanctuary Wood, Belgium
See also
*List of cannon projectiles
A cannon is any large tubular firearm designed to fire a heavy projectile over a long distance. They were first used in Europe and China, and were the archetypical form of artillery. Round shot and grapeshot were the early projectiles used in ...
*Claymore mine
The Claymore mine is a directional anti-personnel mine developed for the United States Armed Forces. Its inventor, Norman MacLeod, named the mine after a large medieval Scottish sword. Unlike a conventional land mine, the Claymore is command-de ...
*Continuous-rod warhead
A continuous-rod warhead is a specialized munition exhibiting an annular blast fragmentation pattern, thus when exploding it spreads into a large circle cutting through target. It is used in anti-aircraft and anti-missile missiles.
Early anti-a ...
*Grapeshot
Grapeshot is a type of artillery round invented by a British Officer during the Napoleonic Wars. It was used mainly as an anti infantry round, but had other uses in naval combat.
In artillery, a grapeshot is a type of ammunition that consists of ...
Notes
References
Sources
* Bethel, HA. 1911. ''Modern Artillery in the Field - a description of the artillery of the field army, and the principles and methods of its employment''. London: Macmillan and Co Limited
* Hogg, OFG. 1970. ''Artillery: its origin, heyday and decline''. London: C. Hurst & Company.
* Keegan, John. ''The Face of Battle
''The Face of Battle'' is a 1976 non-fiction book on military history by the English military historian John Keegan. It deals first with the structure of historical writing about battles, the strengths and weaknesses of the "battle piece," and th ...
''. London: Jonathan Cape, 1976.
* A. MARSHALL, F.I.C. (Chemical Inspector, Indian Ordnance Department)
"The Invention and Development of the Shrapnel Shell" from ''Journal of the Royal Artillery'', January, 1920
* Sheldon, Jack (2007)
''The German Army on the Somme 1914–1916''
Barnsley, South York, UK: Pen & Sword Military. . .
External links
*Douglas T Hamilton
Shrapnel Shell Manufacture. A Comprehensive Treatise. New York: Industrial Press, 1915
*Various authors
"Shrapnel and other war material" : Reprint of articles in American Machinist
New York : McGraw-Hill, 1915
{{DEFAULTSORT:Shrapnel Shell
Artillery shells
English inventions