Tag: Manufacturing

Second World War Anglo-American Ammunition Contract

Recently a very interesting document surfaced in an online auction, while it eventually sold for more than I could afford, I thought it was worth sharing some of the interesting images of the document that were shared in the auction.

Front page of a draft contract for ammunition, drawn up between the British Purchasing Commission and the Western Cartridge Co. (via War-Office)

The document is a draft of a contract to order .303 ammunition from the Western Cartridge Company, part of the Olin Corporation. Before the US passed the Lend-Lease Act, in March 1941, which cleared the was for greater material assistance from the US to Britain the British Purchasing Commission was tasked with procuring arms, ammunition and materials from US companies.

First page of the contract (via War-Office)

The document, originally drawn up in December 1940 called for a mind-blowing 75 million cartridge per month. To do this the Western Cartridge Company needed to expand its production capacity. The contract deals with the intricacies of expanding the company’s manufacturing base and how this expansion would be paid for.

A still from a British newsreel c.1942, showing a British ammunition factory.

The contract states that the .303 ammunition would be for aircraft, for use in weapons like the belt-fed .303 Browning machine guns used in the RAF’s bombers and fighters. The contract mentions that a total of 750 million rounds are required. 20% of these could be requested, at a month’s notice, to be tracer rounds.

It is fascinating to see not only the typed and stapled amendments but also the handwritten notes in the contract’s margins which change quantities, dates and other details. The ammunition is described in ‘Exhibit F’ of the contract as being ‘MkVII .303’. The contract also mentions that the Western Cartridge Company could use its own smokeless powder for the first 100 million rounds and subsequently either their own or powder from Du Pont or the Hercules Powder Company. This means that the ammunition was probably MkVIIIz, as the cartridges did not use Cordite. It is unclear whether the projectiles to be used in the Western Cartridge Co. cartridges used the MkVIIIz boat tail .303 projectile.

A still from a British newsreel c.1942, showing .303 ammunition being tested at a British ammunition factory. The ammunition is being tested in a Vickers Gun, a Bren LMG, a Vickers K and a .303 aircraft Browning

The Western Cartridge Company was not the only US ammunition manufacturer to produce .303. Winchester, another Olin Corporation manufacturer, and the Peter’s Cartridge Company also produced .303 MkVIIIZ.

Sadly we don’t have the rest of the document to examine but these pages offer a really interesting insight into how Britain was procuring ammunition for various weapons during the early part of the war when the situation looked increasingly desperate.

Pages from the March 1941 contract (via War-Office)

A subsequent auction listing for ‘Contract No. A-1562. Requisition No. U.S.233. Dated March, 1941’ also calls for a substantial amount of ammunition, some 400,000,000 rounds. The 42 page contract refers to the ammunition as MkVII and notes the use of Hercules Hivel 300 powder and describes it as ‘S.A. Ball .303 with American modifications dated 7 November, 1940’. The March 1941 contract also states that depending on testing it could be used for ground or air use.

If you found this interesting check out our article/video on a unique Remington M1903 Prototype chambered in .303 built for Britain around the same time!

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Bibliography:

The .303 British Service Cartridge, R. Tebbutt, (source)
Original WW2 British Contract for Manufacture of .303 Ammunition by Winchester, Dec. 1940 eBay/War-Office (source)
Original WW2 British Contract for Manufacture of .303 Ammunition by Winchester, Mar. 1941 eBay/War-Office (source)

British Military Small Arms Ammo, (source)

The Browning Machine Gun – Rifle Calibre Browning Abroad, D. Goldsmith, (2006)
British 303 Cartridge Case Identification, S. Taylor, (source)

Footage:

Manufacture and testing of 0.303″ Ammunition in 1942 (source)

Making Mills Bombs

The No.36 or Mills Bomb was one of the longest serving grenades, developed during the First World War it originated from a Belgian design by Albert Dewandre and Capitaine Léon Roland. It was improved by a British industrialist, William Mills, who owned several metal forging factories.

A No.36 Grenade (Matthew Moss)

It entered service in late 1915 as the No.5 Mk1 and continued to be improved during the war with several iterations before it finally became the No.36M Mk1. We’ll look at the Mills bombs development more closely in a future video/article – today, with the help of some 1940s newsreels from New Zealand we’re going to look at how they were manufactured. While the newsreel doesn’t state the factories featured they were made by a number of factories including Anderson Engineering in Christchurch (these were marked with an “A” below the filler plug), Booth Mcdonald, of Christchurch (marked BM), Scott Brothers, also of Christchurch (marked SB), and Mason & Porter, of Mt Wellington, in Ackland (marked MP).

William Mills’ 1916 Patent for the grenade.

In the first newsreel, courtesy of Archives New Zealand (Weekly Review No. 70 (1943)), we see No.36 grenades being cast – the newsreel takes a slightly humorous approach of describing the process as a recipe – making ‘pineapples’ – a slang name by which grenades were sometime’s known. The factory is using the sand casting method with a pattern pressed into the sand and then removed. The two halves of the grenade’s body are pressed into sand, a pressed sand core could then be placed inside which would allow the grenade’s body to be poured hollow to allow room for explosives and detonator. If we again pause here we can see a machinist is centring and counter-sinking the filling hole’s first thread for its plug.

Cast grenade bodies ready for filling (Archives New Zealand)

The footage includes a brief shot we see a woman factory worker drilling out the top of the grenade’s body and perhaps de-burring the side of the safety lever holder. In the next shot we see more machinists at work with one lady linishing the body of the grenade, removing imperfections from the casting on a grinder or polishing wheel and in the background some women a working on milling machines or drill presses. 

Women factory workers linishing the grenade body castings (Archives New Zealand)

At the very end of the film we can see the grenade bodies are stacked ready for the next phase of production. Sadly, we don’t see the threading of the filling hole or base in this film nor the painting or filling of the grenades.

In the second newsreel (Weekly Review No. 63 (1942)), however, which celebrates the production of 1 million grenades, we do seem more of the production process. In this short segment we see how the grenades are filled and how they work. We see the cast bodies of the grenades being transported on a conveyor after being shellacked to keep moisture out. If we pause here we can see this worker packing a case with “gascheck” discs and fuses.

Loading grenades, fuses and gas checks into a transit case (Archives New Zealand)

The gas check disc and a 7 second fuse was used when the grenade was being fired from a rifle’s cup discharger, while a 4 second fuse was favoured when throwing by hand. In this final clip we see the internals of a grenade – which was filled with just over 2oz of explosive through the round filling-hole (on the side opposite the safety lever) which was then screw plugged. The newsreel then concludes the grenade segment by showing the striker spring inside being compressed and a No.27 Detonator, with fuse, being inserted into the sectioned grenade.

We’ll examine more British grenades, including the No.36 in future videos and articles.

If you enjoyed this video and article please consider supporting our work here. We have some great perks available for Patreon Supporters – including custom stickers and early access to videos! Thank you for your support!

Bibliography:

Weekly Review No. 63 (1942)

Weekly Review No. 70 (1943)

W. Mills, ‘Grenade and Other Like Apparatus’, 4 Apr. 1916, US Patent #1178092, (source)

NZ Mills Grenades, Lexpev.nl, (source)

No.36 Mk1 Grenades, MillsGrenades, (source)