Irish (?) contract No4 rifles

[SpikeDD]

Although I don't have any facts to offer, I, for one, am enjoying the read. I hope to see it continue. I do have a 6/53 Mk.2 PF 309129 that falls in the N/K batch.

[Frederick303]

RobDD

Not to get back into it, but since you ask directly:

Here is a list of the significant purchases of ground equipment and the dates: All from the previous listed sources, except the .22 cal rifle purchase. Dates approximate, some reflect order date, so reflect delivery date.

1948: 4 Churchill Tanks
1949: 16 MKII/1 25 pounders .
1949: 6 6 pounders.
1950/52: ~990 SMLE MKIII .22 cal. conversions, partially from excess RAF stock sand partially from rifles rebuilt by Parker hale.
1951~52 12 17 pounders.
1952/53: 8 Rebuilt 25 pounders.
1953: Karl Gustave sub machine guns, Quantity unknown but over 600, based on Military archives (most likely a lot more, if TOE is to be believed no less than 2,300.
1954: 18 Bofers L60 AA guns
1954 to 1956: a certain quantity of No 4 MK II rifles.
1954 to 1955: 24 MK III 25 pounders
1954~1957: 72 Brandt 120 mm mortars.
1958: two radar controlled 40 mm Bofers L70 AA guns and associated kit. (Free?)
1958~59: 8 Comet tanks.


The data above does not exactly cover the plans of the Irish army, For example on the 25 Pounders the requirement for replacement of the 75 mm (12), 18 pounders (37) and 3.7 inch Howitzers (4) was formulated in 1948. The First 16 were purchased around 1949. In 1952/53 an additional 8 rebuilt 25 pounders were received.

Now that gave the Irish army 24 25 pounder in 1953 with 4,800 rounds of ammunition. That same year the formal mobilization plans of the Irish army showed a requirement for 192 guns (~3 division supply of 64 guns each) and ~200,000 rounds of ammunition. The British offered to sell in 53/54 35,500 rounds of 25 Pounder shell ammunition with an older pattern fuse. That older fuse was a matter of some dispute, the exact issue not contained in the Info I have.

In any case the final figure of 25 Pounders obtained by 1959 was 48, of three patterns (MK II/1, MKIII/1 and MKIV/1, all on the MK I carriage.

Because that was insufficient for the total mobilization needs, the ancient 18 pounders remained in service until at least the late 1960s, (perhaps only on paper) with something like 36 remaining on the books between various forts and units. The 3.7, 75mm and 60 pounders were all sold to interarms in 1959.

Why such a small force (~8000 regulars) needed 48 25 pounders, 36 18 pounders and 72 120 mm Mortars unless they had plans to expand in time of war is something worth considering. Similar the reference found to the staff requirement for 192 25 pounders and 200,000 rounds of ammunition for them is also indicative of the mind set at the time the No4 MK II rifles were purchased.

Regards

Fredrick

One last request to anyone who might also be on Gunboards: I have not been able to get on that board for some time. My log on was “Fritz” on that site and I did a few Irish rifle write ups for that site. In any case I lost my password and changed my Email address twice since. Since then I cannot get a response from the administrators to find a way to get back on as” Fritz”, I presume because I need to access the site form my old email that no longer exists. Could anyone who is on that site Email the admin for me? I was never in trouble with any admin, nor was I thrown off. Not sure how else to get the Admin attention, as they have ignored all my emails from outside of the system.

Thanks to anyone who can help, private email for needed details.

[RobD]

Frederick, do you know what happened to the hundreds of millions of rounds of .303 ammo that would have been needed to feed the rifles?
Are we yet to see it emerge onto the open market, or was it the WW2-dated stuff which we have been shooting for decades - with increasingly click-bang results?

[Mk VII]

I seem to recall that Winchester made it for them. They were supposedly still set up to make it some years back when HBSA was looking at getting some made.

[ssj]

Fredrick I have an Irish contract sportster the seller got it off his dad in the early 1980s, and it sat in his safe until 2 year ago with the 20 rounds of ammo (6 used) and held by him until I bought it, ergo some guns must have been sold earlier than 1991.

rickv100, slight of hand maybe, Eire is not the United Kingdom.

[therno]

Frederick, do you know what happened to the hundreds of millions of rounds of .303 ammo that would have been needed to feed the rifles?
Are we yet to see it emerge onto the open market, or was it the WW2-dated stuff which we have been shooting for decades - with increasingly click-bang results?

There is always this plain jane stuff that has been a bit of a mystery [ATTACH]61816[/

Can anyone date this box of .303?

And there is all the unmarked POF .303 that is showing up a lot lately on the market.

Military Surplus Ammo 303 British 174 Grain Full Metal Jacket Berdan


Just a thought not expert.

[Frederick303]

Since Folks seem to be interested I will continue with info until folks say “oh please….just shut up!”, as I confess some years ago I spent a lot of time researching Irish rifles.


Regarding Irish ammunition stocks ammunition, I know very little. I do know that the Irish army in WWII was dependent on the British supplying stocks if they were actually invaded by the Germans.

Here is the data I have on the Irish army stocks at the beginning of WWII and the supplies they received from the UK during the war, according to official records:

Stocks on hand: 31 March 1940

MK VII Ball, clipped or boxed: 13,919,995
MKVIIZ, ball (old WWI ammo): 365,550
MKVII, belted for MG: 13,709,968
Tracer (belted and boxed): 93,301
AP, (packing unknown): 12,328
Aero proofed 9for synchronized guns): 215,998

Total on hand: 28,317,140

If you consider the numbers of rifles and boxed or clipped ammo, they only had 337 rounds per rifle, though once the proof expired the aero ammo could have been utilized in rifles (or MGs).

During the course of the war the following quantities of ammunition were received:

.303 belted and boxed (no clipped ammo on record): 620,208
Aero proofed tracer: 354,184
Aero proofed ball: 579,792

.300, for M1917 rifles: 5,000,000

From the above you can see they had barely any training ammunition at all. The 250 rounds per M1917 allowed very little ammunition for training and combat “units of fire”, the most I have ever heard of LDF troops firing a M1917 rifle in training was 15 rounds per man.

Given the 620,208 .303 rounds had to be split between rifles (~37,500 serviceable by end of war) Vickers (508), Hotchkiss (268), Lewis ground guns (803), Bren guns (253), that left very little ammunition for training per gun or per man. Basically it comes out to ~15 rounds per gun or 14.7 rounds per man

Part of this was made up by impressing of the .22 cal rifles, both farm guns (for vermin control) and from the small bore clubs, such as they existed. No figures on total rifles impressed have come to light, it seems in the case of the FCA most of the rifles were borrowed/donated and did not exist on official roles. In so far as the published records show, there were no .22 cal SMLE conversions in use during WWII.

On 31 March 1940 the army had a stock of 2,344,832 rounds of .22 cal ammunition impressed from all sources. To this were added and additional 4,576,500 rounds between 1940 and 1945. So there were a total number of 6,921,332 .22 cal rounds available between 1940 and 1945 with the last 100,000 rounds being delivered in 1945. A total of ~56,000 men went through the regular defense forces, of which something over 42,000 would have been expected to have some knowledge of shooting. In the FCA the total number of men that went through was in excess of 100,000, but the numbers of men who would have been issued an arm would be something around 42,000 (other than men equipped with shotguns, who provided their own), the total number of men who might need to train with a .22 would be on the order of 85,000 men, or about 81.4 rounds per man. Not a lot, but more than the 15 rounds allowed for each FCA fellow issued a M1917 rifle.

So the reality was the Irish Army did not have large stocks of ammunition to start with. The training disposition records are not to be found in any source I have access to.

In the post war period I have read very little that I have notes on but what I recall (which is subject to the 50 year old brain limitations):

In the post war period 1948 to 1958 the yearly Army induction varied from between 2,463 and 4,591 new soldiers. Assuming each one had to go through a musketry course, and the minimum musketry course I have read of in commonwealth requires about 250 rounds, the yearly basic training allotment, exclusive of LMG and MG, would be between 615,750 and 1,147,750 rounds of full bore ammunition. This ignores the FCA, which had about 2.5 times the personnel. With the only arms issued to the FCA through 1956 being the SMLE and grenade launching rifle, the training requirements even in an abbreviated shooting schedule would require some considerable stocks of .303 full bore ammunition.

The acquisition of .22 cal SMLE conversions in the 1950 to 1952 time frame may have reduced this requirement somewhat. To what extent I know not, but the TOE of .22 cal SMLE rifles in a full strength FCA battalion was 12 guns, anything less than half strength down to 150 men being 6 guns. I have never run across the allotment, if any, to the regular forces of .22 cal rifles but assume it was of a similar if not higher figure.


I should also mention that the 99 FCA battalion scheme was abandoned in 1958 when the FAC was changed to a 17 Infantry battalion and 3 artillery regiment set up, with the combination of many understrength company scale units and a greater emphasis on training. With reductions in the FCA in the post 1962 time period, (as a result with the higher time requirements and mandatory age retirements), the force declined to something in the 17,000 to 18,000 range by 1964. In any case, in the 1 October 1959 Defense summary of changes with the new integrated FCA, it was stated that existing stocks of ammunition would not allow for more than a few days of combat before all army stocks would be expended. In any case in what limited figures I have indicate accumulating stocks of shells/SAA for war reserves was a real issue and costly, which meant there were not hundreds of millions of rounds sitting around in war reserve, at least through 1950s and into the 1960s.

Starting in late 1961~62 the ideas of having an integrated FCA force sort of went to pot when the regular army was re-equipped with FN-FAL and FN-MAG along with other modern small arms. Meanwhile the FCA artillery units would retain the 18 pounder (12 per regiment) until at least 1966. The FCA went from being considered a viable defense force to one dedicated to internal security directed primarily against IRA and other activities (such as guarding the border with Ulster). Under such circumstances the requirement for training ammunition and small arms competency dropped, while muster times increased.

What ammunition that was ordered in this period (up to 1968) seems to have been ordered from the UK. That is based not on any book but conversations from folks were disposing of the old stocks of time expired ammunition in the late 1980s and folks in the FCA training with Brens in the 1990s.

On that point it was indicated to me that the Irish army followed UK practice on ammunition and proof of same. I may have the numbers not quite right as I am writing from memory but in this period (~1967) MK VII ball was considered in “proof” until 12 years, after which every 2 years a sample of the ammunition had to be tested until age 18 years, after which a sample was supposed to be reproved (tested) until age 21 years. At that point the ammunition was supposed to downgrade for training purposes only. If lots failed proof, ( the criteria for which I do not recall but do note hang-fires were a part of that reproof test) then the lot was scrapped. Exactly what that meant in the real world I do not know, as I have no idea if the regulations in place in 1967 were still followed in 1980.

In any case the WCC 1981 MK VIIZ ammunition that many have bought up was at least in part done for the Irish. There exist cans of the WCC 81 .303 ammunition with Irish army markings stenciled on the US pattern .50 cal. cans. In so far as I know, these were the only lots post 1968 that were bought by the Irish that were not sourced from the UK, though it is quite possible 1970s FN lots were purchased as well, I simply have not researched this. The WCC 81 lot is well known and some portion of this ammunition was sold commercially.

The No4 MK II rifles were phased out of FCA service in 1988. The first sales, as recorded earlier were, (according to official record) in 1991, with the final major lot sold in 1996/97. As of 2004 840 remained plus 50 snipers. In recent years some of the No 32 scopes have been sourced out of Northern Ireland, any sale of the other rifles does not seem to be recorded. Regardless the requirement for rifle use of the .303 ended in 1988.

However the FCA retained their MKII/MKIII Bren guns from 1989 to sometime between 2004 and 2006, by which time they were finally replaced. According to the soldiers that have put down their experiences, even in this 1989-2004 period they were using ammunition that was packed in 32 round boxes, or in 10 round cut cloth strips from Vickers belts. So it is apparent any remaining stocks of .303 MK VII non Z type were most likely expended in the Brens during this 15 to 17 year period. Many of these cartridges would have been out of date code as according to British records, the last lot of MK VII (with cordite) was loaded by Kynoch in the 1968/69 period (though somebody has found a 1970 marked VII case on a military range and so noted it).

Now with regards to the discontinuing of the .303 and what was done with old lots that failed proof or were ultimately so old as they were to have considered to be proof expired: When I was researching the dumping of arms into the Irish sea one of the fellows I corresponded with recalled dumping old 1940s dated lots of .303 still in the cases in the mid to late 1980s. He did not recall the exact date of when this occurred or what the date code were, he simply recalled the can dates were in the 1940s and that the ammo was packed in metal tins that contained two wooden boxes each, with either 250 belted or 288 rounds per box. The dates were on the outside of the metal case and were apparently British, though he recalled none of the markings or what factories they came from.


So the idea the Irish are sitting on large lots of .303 are likely…………….not true. That said my knowledge on Irish ammunition is sparse and so it is quite possible I have missed something, but this is the best information I have.

SSJ,

There were sales of SMLE rifles prior; if you go to Gunboards I have a lot of that data written up there.

[Patrick Chadwick]

For that very informative post, many thanks to Frederick (who also identified my Irish SMLE on an earlier occasion).

[Thunderbox]

The Irish at some point - 1980s? - ordered a large quantity of .303" MkVIIz ammunition (Boxer case) from MEN in Germany. As far as i know, they are still holding stocks of this ammunition.

[stencollector]

I am going to meander a bit from the original thread here, but I find the info on the artillery of the Irish Army quite interesting. I work for the RCA museum, and recently organized and shelved two triwalls of 25 pdr parts the Irish Army gave us a few years ago. We of course paid the shipping.

There were probably some 400 line items to go through, and after the sorting and matching with the various 25 pdr manuals was done, I was left with a small pile of unidentified. One of the problems I ran into was that the Irish applied their own part numbers to both the repair parts, the accessories, and the tooling.

While many of their index cards referred to the original British numbers, everything was done on the very old system of manual supply cards, so errors did exist. I would often have to remove "in the grease" parts and with a magnifying glass try and find the original part numbers. In other cases, the numbers referred to British NSNs, which were not so bad to cross refer to.

The final pile included some tooling and gauges for the 2 pounder, the 18 pounders and their limbers, the 3.7 guns, and even replacement parts for the Martin Perry conversions of the 18 pdrs to rubber tyres from the old carriage wheels.

All in all, it took around 10 days to get it all organized, but now I can go into the shelves (instead of various piles) and find the required spare parts in seconds vice the hours spent trying to match up the Irish descriptions and part numbers.