After a brief rumour that the much loved and teased ABC TV show 'The Boffin The Builder, The Bombardier only had four episodes (and hence was now over for the year), the programme happily continued to both amuse and provide cringe for the viewers here at AWB.
Ep 5 of this series, rapidly becoming much watch TV if only for the purpose of giving fuel for blog updates, remains in WW1 land but moves for the first time away from the 303 rifle. Instead we are given a brief history of the Leach Trench Catapult (also known as the Leach-Gamage Catapult) before being entertained with our three heroes flinging cricket balls across their firing range.
The Leach-Gamage, named after Mister Claude Pemberton Leach, who designed it, and Gamages, the company who made them, was a 1915 solution for the probably of bombing enemy trenches and had a brief in service period before being replaced with the types of trench mortars we are now familiar with. It was a largish Y shaped frame using rubber to fling grenades in the general direction of German and, depending on bomb and age of the rubber, was reported to have a range between 120 to 200 yards.
So, let's first talk about the show. Now it probably should be pointed out that AWB does actually enjoy watching this 10 minutes or so of three guys being man childs (and the phrase that AWB is refusing to use here is 'completely jealous'), however has an issue with the very casual conclusions that are then drawn at the end.
Our boys this week rather neatly summed up the difference between high and low angle fire to give the background of why this weapon was developed, so points to that. It may have been nice to actually mention at what range their target trench was placed as that would have given us kids at home an idea if the 120 to 200 yards claims were actually correct. Now AWB has always been a bit rubbish at judging distances and is also aware how different camera lenses can drastically foreshorten the distance, but at this stage is not fully convinced our heroes were firing at any great range.
This is a pity as to support the claim made on the show that 'it's a weapon' it would have been nice to know at what range they were capable of reaching, and perhaps more importantly, what sort of spread were they actually getting. The did (claim) to hit the target and filmed a nice little explosion to prove it (so nice it was then shown about 6 times... 'completely jealous'... cough...), but without knowing how many shots were fired (we only see about 4 cricket balls plus the final winning golf ball) we have no way of making any real conclusions.
The show also raises the chuckle, again, in their closing statements by making a comment that pretty much destroys their entire argument. It is mentioned as a bit of historical trivia that one unit in France used their catapults to send offensive messages to the Germans in clay pots. Not bombs. That does seem to AWB at least to sum up exactly how useful the troops in the trenches considered the weapon.
So what have we learnt that we can take into our wargaming?
Not a huge amount. The catapult is clearly a semi static weapon. While our TV heroes make the point it could be carried by one person, they forget that so can a 5m ladder, and just because you can carry one, doesn't mean you want to. The weapon doesn't appear to break down and moving it through a trench to a suitable firing position doesn't strike AWB as a fun task. Taking it with you during an assault also would seem to be rather pointless and of little real use.
The range of between 120 and 200 yards also gives a bit of a clue as to how it could or couldn't be useful. No Man's Land varied in depth and while there were many situations where trenches were that close apart, there were also many where they weren't. It must also be remembered that trench systems evolved to having a rather large amount of depth with forward saps and observation posts creeping out from the 'front'. It does seem that the weapon would be most used from forward saps to bomb the only targets also in range, which in many cases would be enemy forward saps. Does seem a lot of effort for little return.
In an advance, any firepower added by a catapult would have been drowned by other weapons and in defence the slow rate of fire and poor range suggests that picking up one's personal rifle may be a better idea for the crew.
Issue, as claimed in Wikipedia so it must be true, was 12 weapons per division. How this broke down or at what level they controlled at is anyone's guess.
AWB things that if squad or skirmish level WW1 is your thing, then painting and basing one of these up would be a great little extra for your games set in 1915 to early 1916 and also understands the weapon is available in 28mm. Once you start to go up in game scale the weapon would rapidly become a completely minor effect to the extent they could be completely ignored except as many figure variation in your basing.
In summary, TBCubed is still harmless largely non historical fun and it is good to see the props budget has moved on from SMLE rifles.
AWB looks forward to ep 6.
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