16"/50 caliber M1919 gun

16-inch Coastal Defense Gun M1919
16 in Mark III Coastal Defense Gun at the US Army Ordnance Museum
Type	Coastal Artillery
Place of origin	United States
Service history
In service	1920—1946
Used by	United States Army Coast Artillery Corps
Wars	World War II
Production history
Manufacturer	Watervliet Arsenal
Specifications
Weight	484 tons
Barrel length	50 calibers, 66 ft 8 in (20.32 m)

Shell	AP: 2,340 lb (1,060 kg) or 2,100 lb (950 kg)^[1]
Caliber	16 in (406 mm)
Carriage	M1919 Barbette or M1917 disappearing, both fixed
Elevation	-7° to +65°
Traverse	360° (open), 145° (casemated)^[2]
Muzzle velocity	2,700 ft/s (820 m/s)
Maximum firing range	49,100 yd (44,900 m)^[3] 27.9 miles

The 16 inch Gun M1919 was a large coastal artillery piece installed to defend the United States' major seaports between 1920 and 1946. It was operated by the United States Army Coast Artillery Corps. Only a small number were produced; in 1922 the US Navy surplussed a number of their own 16-inch/50 guns, which were mated to modified M1919 carriages and filled the need for additional examples.

History

The first US 16-inch (406 mm) gun started construction in 1895 at Watervliet Arsenal.^[4]^[5] It was known as the M1895 and completed in 1902; only one was built.^[6] It was mounted on a disappearing carriage in Fort Grant on the Pacific side of the Panama Canal Zone in 1914, where it served until scrapped in 1943.^[4]^[7] The weapon's muzzle section was displayed at the Watervliet Arsenal museum, which closed in 2013.^[8]

16-inch Navy MkIIMI gun on M1919 barbette mount in Panama.

The second 16-inch (406 mm) gun was the United States Army 50 caliber Model 1919 (M1919). The first of these was deployed to Fort Michie, Great Gull Island, New York on a unique all-around-fire M1917 disappearing carriage.^[4] An additional six of the Army-designed M1919 guns were built and deployed by 1927 in two-gun batteries on barbette carriages in the harbor defenses of Boston, New York City, and Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.^[9]^[10] The 16-inch gun M1919 was built using the wire-wound method, common in Europe but rare in the United States.^[11]

In 1922, the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty caused the US Navy to cancel the South Dakota-class battleships and the Lexington-class battlecruisers, surplusing 16-inch/50 caliber Mark II and Mark III barrels. Initially, 20 guns were transferred to the Army, which built a new version of the M1919 mount for the naval guns. With funding lacking until 1940, five batteries of two guns each were built 1924-40 in the harbor defenses of Pearl Harbor, Panama (Pacific side), and San Francisco.^[12] In 1940 a near-fiasco was experienced in designing the Iowa-class battleships, and a new gun, the 16"/50 caliber Mark 7 gun, had to be designed for them, as they could not accommodate the Mark 2 and Mark 3 guns.^[13] With war on the horizon, the Navy released the approximately 50 remaining guns, and on 27 July 1940 the Army's Harbor Defense Board recommended the construction of 27 16-inch two-gun batteries to protect strategic points along the US coastline, all to be casemated against air attack, as were almost all of the older 16-inch batteries by this time.

A casemated 16-inch gun. Almost all batteries were casemated by 1940, including the M1919 gun batteries in New York and near Boston.

Typical of this plan were the guns placed to protect Narragansett Bay; two 16-inch guns were placed in Battery Gray, Fort Church, Little Compton, Rhode Island and two more were placed in Battery Hamilton, Fort Greene, Point Judith. A second battery of 16-inch guns at Fort Greene, Battery 109, had construction suspended in 1943 and never received guns. These batteries were placed such that they not only protected Narraganset Bay, but interdicted the main channels into Buzzards Bay and the east end of Long Island Sound.^[14]

By late 1943, the threat of a naval attack on the United States had diminished, and with two or four 16-inch guns in most harbor defenses, construction and arming of further batteries was suspended. As 16-inch guns and a companion improved 6-inch gun were emplaced, older weapons were scrapped. About 21 16-inch gun batteries were completed 1941-44, but not all of these were armed.^[15] With the war over in 1945, most of the remaining coast defense guns, including the recently emplaced 16-inch weapons, were scrapped by 1948.

Specifications

The gun fired a 2,240 lb (1,020 kg). projectile to a range of 26 miles (42 km).^[14] The estimated cost of the gun and barbette was $520,000 in 1938.^[14] The new M1 Gun Data Computer was used in directing these guns.

References

↑ Berhow, p. 61
↑ Berhow, p. 61
↑ Berhow, p. 61
1 2 3 "16-inch Gun Technical Data". Archived from the original on 2009-05-06. Retrieved 2007-06-23.
↑ http://dingler.culture.hu-berlin.de/article/pj316/mi316mi02_2
↑ "Watervliet Arsenal Museum". Archived from the original on 2007-02-05. Retrieved 2007-06-23.
↑ Berhow, pp. 168-169, 221
↑ Article on closure of Watervliet museum
↑ "16-Inch Coast Defense Gun". Retrieved 2007-06-18.
↑ Berhow, pp. 170-173, 224
↑ DiGiulian, Tony, Navweaps.com 16-inch Mk 2 and Mk 3 page
↑ Berhow, p. 224
↑ Friedman Battleships, pp. 311-313
1 2 3 Walter K. Schroder (1980). Defenses of Narragansett Bay in World War II. Rhode Island Bicentennial Foundation. pp. 37–50. ISBN 0-917012-22-4.
↑ Berhow, p. 225

Berhow, Mark A., Ed. (2004). American Seacoast Defenses, A Reference Guide, Second Edition. CDSG Press. ISBN 0-9748167-0-1.
Friedman, Norman (1985). U.S. Battleships: An Illustrated Design History. Annapolis, Maryland: United States Naval Institute. ISBN 978-0-87021-715-9.
Lewis, Emanuel Raymond (1979). Seacoast Fortifications of the United States. Annapolis: Leeward Publications. ISBN 978-0-929521-11-4.

General references

TM 9-2300 Standard Artillery and Fire Control Materiel FEB. 1944
TM 4-210 Seacoast Artillery Weapons Oct. 1944
TM 9-471
SNL E-10
SNL E-20
SNL E-58
American Coast Artillery Materiel 1922 (extensive manufacturing information)

External links

United States artillery of World War II

Tank guns	37 mm gun M5/M6 75 mm gun M2/M3/M6 76 mm gun M1 3 inch gun M7 90 mm gun M3 105 mm howitzer M4

Anti-tank guns	37 mm M3 57 mm M1 75 mm M1897 3 inch M5 90 mm T8 105mm T8

Field, medium and heavy guns	75 mm M1897 75 mm howitzer M1 105 mm howitzer M2 105 mm howitzer M3 4.5 inch gun M1 155 mm howitzer M1918 155 mm howitzer M1 155 mm gun M1918MI 155 mm gun M1/M2 "Long Tom" 8 inch howitzer M1/M2 8-inch gun M1 240 mm howitzer M1

Mortars	60 mm mortar M2 81 mm mortar M1 4.2 inch mortar M2 Little David

Other vehicle-mounted	75 mm howitzer M2/M3 75 mm gun M1897 105 mm howitzer M2 155 mm gun M1918MI 155 mm gun M2

Anti-aircraft guns	37 mm M1 40 mm M1 3 inch M3 90 mm M1 120 mm M1

Coast artillery guns	3-inch gun M1903 90 mm M1 6-inch gun M1903 155 mm gun M1918MI 8-inch Mk. VI 8-inch gun M1888 10-inch gun M1895 12-inch coast defense mortar 12-inch gun M1895 14-inch gun M1907 16-inch gun M1895 16-inch gun M1919 16-inch Marks 2 and 3 16-inch howitzer M1920

Railway artillery	8-inch Mk. VI 8-inch M1888 14-inch M1920

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