Lorry Guns 3rd Afghan War

[smirnoff]

Stewart, in 'The Savage Border', says that 'the [British] Army had thirteen guns mounted on lorries at its disposal' and they were used in the bombardment of Afghan positions at Thal. These were no doubt part of the column from Peshawar under Brigadier-General Reginald Dyer.
If this is accurate does anyone have any info on what the guns were on what type of lorries?
15pdrs seem the most likely (Sykes in his History of Afghanistan) does not mention lorry mounted guns but says that Dyer had '4 15pdrs'

[carlos marighela]

If I can muster the energy I'll take a peek at Robson and see if he has anything to say on the matter. I do recall that there was a battery of 13pdrs used in the campaign (M Battery RHA).

IMO 3.7" howitzers would be more  a likely load.

[smirnoff]

If I can muster the energy I'll take a peek at Robson

Be good if you could as I don't have Robson...

[Westfalia Chris]

I'd be interested to see what comes out of that, too. I'd suspect either Seabrook lorries with 3pdrs or something similar, or maybe portee-style artillery, although I'm not sure the British army used the concept back in the day (I know there was a number of Jeffery Quad-based portees in service with the French).

[Plynkes]

Robson says Dyer's Thal Relief Force had four 15pdrs of the Frontier Garrison Artillery "dragged by lorries." He makes no mention of them being mounted in lorries that I can see.

As for the type, "lorries" is as specific as he gets.

[smirnoff]

Thanks Plynkes.
I'll stick to dragged 15pdrs I think.

Lorries may be Crossley's; at least this image suggests a fair few were in use
http://www.nam.ac.uk/online-collection/detail.php?acc=1982-02-31-175

Note the motorbike and sidecars with MGs on to the right f this image.
Are they Vickers or Lewis guns?

Now...off to see if anyone makes 15pdrs in 28mm

[Arlequín]

I'm not sure how relevant this is, but there are photos around of 'horse guns' being carried on special trailers behind Carden-Loyd tankettes, so the concept of such guns needing to be carried was not under-appreciated at the time, unless of course that problems encountered 'dragging' them in A'stan was what prompted the development in the first place.
 

[carlos marighela]

Robson says Dyer's Thal Relief Force had four 15pdrs of the Frontier Garrison Artillery "dragged by lorries." He makes no mention of them being mounted in lorries that I can see.

As for the type, "lorries" is as specific as he gets.

Good man, saved me the trouble.

I think you'll find that the 15 pounders referred to are the QF 15 pounder which was in use before the war and passed on to the Territorials and used overseas in backwaters like Aden. As it was essentially an export version of the Krupp original you could use any 77mm Krupp M96 field gun, minus the shield.

[Plynkes]

He also says 89 Battery RFA, and one section of 23 Mountain Battery were present with the force, but doesn't mention them in connection with lorries, nor go into specifics about exactly what guns they had.

One last thing, he says Dyer had some lorries drag trees behind them, to stir up dust and give the impression that his force was larger than it really was. I bet his men thanked him for that.  

[smirnoff]

I think you'll find that the 15 pounders referred to are the QF 15 pounder which was in use before the war and passed on to the Territorials and used overseas in backwaters like Aden. As it was essentially an export version of the Krupp original you could use any 77mm Krupp M96 field gun, minus the shield.

Thats handy
Thanks
So would this fit the bill (minus shield)
http://www.northstarfigures.com/prod.php?prod=616

[Bullshott]

And this one from 1st Corps would fit for the sidecars (with head changes):

[carlos marighela]

Thats handy
Thanks
So would this fit the bill (minus shield)
http://www.northstarfigures.com/prod.php?prod=616

Yup, that's the one.

Artillery mentioned by Robson includes 4.5 " Howitzers,  RFA 13 pounder field guns, the aforementioned 15 pounders, 2.75" mountain guns, 3.7 " Pack Howitzers and the single battery of RGA manned, tractor towed 6" howitzers. At least three RFA batteries are listed in the orbats. Whether any of them had 18 pounders I have no idea.

[Ste long 1971]

There is an article on the landships 2 website referring to TE Lawrence using 10 pounder mountain guns mounted on the portee style on the rear decks of Talbot trucks. The article doesn't have any photos of these gun trucks unfortunately. See the link below
http://www.landships.info/landships/artillery_articles.html#

[smirnoff]

There is an article on the landships 2 website referring to TE Lawrence using 10 pounder mountain guns mounted on the portee style on the rear decks of Talbot trucks. The article doesn't have any photos of these gun trucks unfortunately. See the link below
http://www.landships.info/landships/artillery_articles.html#

Excellent find
Now where can I get a Talbot truck in 28mm scale....

[Ste long 1971]

I haven't been able to locate a suitable talbot lorry in 28mm. I'm currently in the process of building a gun portee truck on a crossley tender truck, using a Perrys gun asthe10pounder mountain gun. The dilemma I'm having is would the gun be mounted with its wheels in place or not. I haven't been able to find any information either way.