The famous French "seventy-fives" (meaning 75 millimetres calibre) which played such a great part in the war, are field guns intended to move rapidly and to operate with infantry.
Both these types of gun were used by the British in South Africa, as also were some field howitzers, a type of gun to which further reference will be made later. But the Boers taught the world something new as to the possibilities of moving heavy guns quickly. Perhaps the reason for this was that they, being something of the nature of amateurs in the art of warfare, were less under the influence of tradition. Anyway, they surprised the British by the quick way in which they moved heavy guns, sometimes into quite difficult positions, over rough ground and up steep hills. These heavy guns of theirs were called by the British soldiers "Long Toms."
But the British were quick to respond, particularly the ever-resourceful navy. When the war broke out there were, in the neighbourhood of Durban, a number of warships which had as part of their own armament some of those guns which afterwards became famous as "4·7's," that being the diameter of the bore in inches. They were of the long shape usual in naval guns, and it is easy to see that they were much heavier than the field guns of 3 inches or so in diameter.
Captain Scott (now Admiral Sir Percy Scott) saw that these would be useful, so he quickly designed some carriages for them, got these made in the railway workshops at Durban, and in a few hours was rushing them up to Ladysmith. It was these guns very largely which enabled that town to hold out for so long, until, in fact, it was triumphantly relieved.
Thus the effect of the Boer war was to show that much heavier weapons could be manipulated in the field than had been considered possible before. The Great War which followed but a few years later carried on this same lesson, for one of the great surprises with which the Allies were confronted in the early days of the conflict was the inexplicable fall of fortresses which till then had been deemed almost impregnable.
Liége, Namur, Maubeuge and, finally, Antwerp, all fell to a wonderful gun of enormous dimensions which the Austrians had produced from up their sleeve, so to speak. Like conjurers they had kept them secret until the last moment.
These weapons which made history so fast were of the kind called howitzers, a name mentioned just now. It should be explained here that gunners talk of guns and howitzers as if the latter were not guns; but that is only a convenient habit which has grown up, for the latter are unquestionably guns. The distinction is, however, so convenient that we may well adopt it ourselves for the rest of this chapter.
Repeated references have been made already to the question of the length of guns, and it has been pointed out that to get high velocity, great range and vigorous hitting power a gun needs to be as long as possible. On ships this is only limited by the strength of the steel of which the gun is made, for beyond a certain length the gun bends of its own weight. Ashore, however, the difficulties of transport impose a further limitation in most cases, although the famous 4·7, like many other naval guns, has a