Motor Transports in War

by Horace Wyatt

The Utility of the Armoured Car—Improvised and Other Types—The Uses of Touring Cars and Motor Cycles—Specially Equipped Military Motors.

While everyone was aware that the heavy motor would play a very important part in the great war in connection with the transport of supplies and artillery, and that touring cars would be largely used for staff purposes, the enormous extent to which the armoured car has been employed has probably come as something of a surprise. We were, of course, aware of the existence of such machines, but up to the present there had been no real proof of their utility. The German military authorities had evidently, prior to the war, come to their own conclusions on the matter, and the Belgians, whether they were prepared in advance or not, were at least very prompt in following suit. It is doubtful whether, when the war broke out, our own War Department was in possession of a single armoured car, but fortunately this is a type of machine in connection with which deficiencies can be very rapidly made up, and at the time of writing, while no certain quantitative information is available, we are at least aware of the existence of British armoured cars on the Continent, and we know that, for example, London motor omnibuses have been equipped for this class of duty. In this, and in most cases, the improvised armoured car is merely an ordinary vehicle with some simple form of body covered over by armour plating, and with the more vital portions of its mechanism to some degree similarly protected. Thus, some protection is provided for the radiator and steering gear. The dash is covered by steel plating extending upwards to protect the driver, while the platform or body behind is protected by vertical or sloping steel plates. Certain examples of German armoured cars that have been captured answer sufficiently well to this description, but naturally enough in a country where the supply of industrial vehicles is more or less inadequate, the touring car has been selected for adaptation. It has, of course, the advantage of extra speed, and the disadvantage of the vulnerability of pneumatic tyres. Some of these improvised armoured cars merely carry men armed with rifles, while others are equipped with light machine guns. In many instances, searchlights, or very strong head lamps, are fitted. The latter can, of course, be operated by the now familiar electric system, a small dynamo and a battery of cells being carried upon the car. The most convenient arrangement for a more powerful searchlight is to be found in the use of a petrol-electric vehicle in which the ordinary change-speed gears are dispensed with, and their place taken by electric machines. The car engine drives a dynamo which generates electric current. This is supplied to an electric motor from which the power is transmitted to the rear wheels. The arrangement is tantamount to an infinitely variable change speed gear, and the important point in connection with the subject under consideration is that the whole or part of the engine power can be used for generating electric current, which can be easily applied to a searchlight on the car.

“The Autocar” illustration.
A “CHARRON” ARMOURED CAR WITH MACHINE GUN.

“The Autocar” illustration.
A “SCHNEIDER” ARMOURED CAR WITH QUICK-FIRING GUN.

Armoured cars carrying powerful lights are no doubt very effective for reconnoitring during the night. The lights can be switched on quite suddenly and some damage inflicted upon an enemy, and the light switched off again before there is time for fire to be returned or the machine to be located effectively. The car can then be moved rapidly to some other point, and the manœuvre repeated. In general, the armoured car has been used as a kind of advance guard in front of the screen of cavalry which performs the double duty of concealing the movement of its own infantry and locating the forces of the enemy. Just as the Germans employed cavalry for this purpose to an unprecedented extent in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870, and so gained an enormous advantage over their opponents, so the attempt has been made on this occasion to utilise a still more rapid and effective means towards the same ends. As already suggested, any advantage that may have accrued from the utilisation of a new method of this kind need only be a purely temporary one, since any desired quantity of the enormous number of available machines can—if it appears desirable—be converted into armoured cars for our own use or that of our allies at very short notice. One would imagine that events will prove that the armoured motor is valuable as an irritant rather than as a means of locating hostile forces or screening one’s own, since both these latter ends are very much affected by the use of aeroplanes, which make it practically impossible to move large bodies of men secure from observation, and correspondingly easy to gather fairly accurate information as to the whereabouts and strength of the enemy.

So far we have touched only upon extemporised armoured vehicles as distinct from those actually designed in the first instance for this specific duty. The first armoured car was produced as long ago as 1896. The design was published in The Autocar only a week after the Act which permitted a motor car to exceed four miles an hour on British roads, and to dispense with the man walking in front with a red flag, came into force. The suggestion emanated from the late Mr. E. J. Pennington, and the machine, the mechanism of which was necessarily somewhat primitive, was arranged to carry two small machine guns the cranks of which were to be driven by the car engine with a view to increasing the rapidity of fire. In those days, the machine gun was usually hand-cranked. At intervals since that time various designs had been brought out, the general principle being to employ a completely armoured car, the driver of which would in most cases be in considerable danger of accident, owing to the way in which the protection provided for him obscured the view of the road on either side. In the majority of cases, the vehicle was designed to carry one machine gun mounted in a turret above the roof. Thus, in a design got out by the Charron Company some time back, the machine gun was contained in a rotating turret a little way forward of the rear axle. The joint between this turret and the roof of the car involved a flange and a thick rubber ring. The turret rotated on a central vertical shaft, and on this shaft was a screw wheel. The effect of turning this wheel was to raise or lower the turret. When the machine gun had been drawn into the right position with the turret raised, the wheel was turned bringing the turret down hard against the rubber ring which held it securely, and prevented it from shaking about while the gun was being fired.

“The Autocar” illustration.
AN ITALIAN DESIGN FOR A MOTOR BATTERY OF QUICK-FIRING GUNS. THE SIDES SWIVEL ROUND TO FACE IN ANY DESIRED POSITION.