Royal engineers "sappers" tunnel rifle

[browningautorifle]

I'll have one...and the leg rig that goes with it. And two sets of bunny cups...and earplugs...

[Peter Laidler]

I have to admit that I stopped listening to a lot of the old horse sh............, er........... manure that some of these old boys used to tell us in the years I was at Warminster and before, especially when I was writing books. Sten guns thrown into rooms, killing all. Making cup grenades go further by firing a live round instead of a ballastite and.............

[Gil Boyd]

Patrick,
Knowing it was WW1 and yet another war, regardless of that, I can't really see any rank agreeing to the wholesale destruction of a perfectly good service rifle, without then knowing what its new characteristics were going to be, when there were clearly other options around at the time in terms of silenced weapons had they required it for this specific task of tunneling!
This modification would never have been approved by those in power IMHO regardless of it being in the frontline. Those selected to do this tunnelling job were selected back in England, because they were miners who were then put into this unit within the "Royal Engineers". If this adapted weapon was part of their training and beat up to going to France, this adapted weapon would certainly have shown up on Military pamphlets of the day or at least photographs, of which there are many of this brave band of men!

The truth is out there somewhere, I am sure showing either a man with a holster with it showing off like Mad Max or not as the case may be, but I have never seen or heard of one and I read about WW1 and visit the sites regularly.
Presumably the guys selling this copy of an original, copied it from somewhere??

[Roger Payne]

Gil, look at p137 of Peter Barton's book. At least one other contemporaneous reference does exist, I think in one of the books written at or shortly after the war, on the subject of the RE Tunnelling Companies. Unfortunately I can't remember where I've come across it & Nigel is the only other person I know who has access to it, but hasn't chipped in yet - though I know he is out of the country this weekend, which probably explains why! Major Stokes was a serving RE officer at the time he made the sketch. I am NOT trying to defend this piece, just to state that, even if unofficially, some rifles were shortened & the matter got noticed by Stokes at least. I am with everyone else on the undesirability of using such a beast.

Concerning the matter of the unauthorised mutilation of government property (a SMLE) I think that due to the conditions prevalent on the Western Front (which we have never seen since) it would not have been too difficult to acquire a 'spare' rifle. 'Normal' weekly trench wastage averaged 5000 casualties. Or to look at it another way, just whilst out field walking I have found two rifles within walking distance of my little cottage on The Somme SO FAR THIS YEAR; that's after a gap of a century during which the fields have been ploughed hundreds of times, & no doubt thousands of people have walked them looking for souvenirs. There would probably have been rather more around in 1916.

[RobD]

One other explanation which has been suggested in the past for these shortened rifles has been as a detonator etc. for booby traps.
I have no knowledge about the feasibility of this; nor whether this was ever done in the Great War.
For what it's worth, cut-down Martini Henry actions were (according to legend) improvised as detonators for train-wrecking in the Anglo Boer War. I have heard tell of two methods: (a) The downward flexing of the rail under the weight of the train was transmitted to the trigger of the M-H, and the muzzle blast directed into a bundle of dynamite and (b) the concealed Boer (or irish volunteer) pulled on a length of string. I take these with a pinch of salt.

[Gil Boyd]

Roger,
Thanks for that and we'll wait out to be convinced I am sure. Our two tunneling Companies were the (179th and 185th) Royal Engineers who worked at the Glory Hole.

The Australians also had a tunneling company namely the 1st Australian Tunneling Company

[Roger Payne]

Rob,
I know of a Mk1 SMLE with the barrel cropped to about two inches, a stubby non-standard butt type of effort (with a metal T piece fitted to the end of the stock bolt), & a brass ring passed through the trigger guard - presumably for the attachment of a length of cord. Some Lee Enfields were definitely cut down for use as mortar initiatiors as well as latterly for smoke dischargers, but I'm not so sure about this one as there would be no need to fashion the sort of butt. But it certainly exists alright, it's a dig up found near High Wood last year & now resides in an Ikea display cabinet locally to where it was found! If I can ever figure out how to reduce the photo's to a more manageable file size using my super new Windows 8 I'll post something.........

[Gil Boyd]

Roger,
As I kicked off this thread, and stirred some interesting points in reply which is what is brilliant about this site, I have fired my question in directly to the Royal Engineers Museum in Kent who are now researching it.
Interestingly enough two of their long term members I spoke to, had never heard of such modifications to the rifle in the way described...............wait out!

[Peter Laidler]

I cxan imagine the scene........

Tunnelliung Sgt: Sapper Smith, what the xxxxis that and where are you taking it if I might be so bold as to ask........
Spr Smith: It's a cut down rifle Sgt in case we find any of those beastly Bosche on our way
Sgt: And what, pray, will you do with that then........?
Spr Smith: I'll sort of point it at them and, well....., shoot them Sgt.
Sgt: What....., you mean that you'll shoot it while we are down in the tunnell old chap?
Spr Smith: Yes, that's the idea. You know, short and handy, pack a punch and it'd certainly hurt them - or one of them
Sgt: Yes, short, handy and packs a punch. That's just what'll happen when it goes into your bottom you naughty lad. Don't you worry about your ears either lad because I'll have hit you around both of them with it if you take that down there. Now..........

I can leave the rest of the conversation up to your imagination.

Maybe we should just accept that there are two schools of thought. The naive, stupid non believers who still believe in Christmas and fairy stories and those wise clued up believers.

And here I'm going to prove the point and debunk the myth once and for all.

My friend has an underground 30 metre test range and he also has a handfull of short barrelled rubbish SMLE actions. I am going to arrange for anyone game enough to shoot one of these sheer land of fiction monstrosities down there with the standard ear defenders of the era. Vaseline impregnated cotton wool.

Any takers?

[Roger Payne]

Gil, thanks.