Shuvalov's "secret howitzer"
Weapon from museums. While studying at the Leningrad Institute of Railway Engineers, I lived in a student hostel on the Petrogradskaya side, next to the Peter and Paul Fortress. Since he was drawing from childhood Tanks and planes, then I could not pass by the Museum of Engineering Troops and Artillery. A camera was an unaffordable luxury for a student at that time. So I bought an album and went to the museum on weekends, since it was a five-minute walk from the hostel, and I drew everything I could. Cannons, guns, swords and banners. Cavalrymen with paintings on the walls of the museum. I am still looking through these old yellowed albums with pleasure. Some parts of the weapon are not always visible in the photo. And in books you will not see the whole range of small arms of the 90th-XNUMXth centuries. Until the XNUMXs of the last century, one could rarely read about weapons in popular literature.
Historical literature has paid more attention to the description of events than to the technical parameters of weapons of that period.
After reading V. Pikul's novel "Pen and Sword", I enthusiastically began to dig information on the history of the Seven Years War, fortunately, as a conscientious reader, I was admitted to the holy of holies of the city library in my native Velikiye Luki. And the institute's library had a good collection of historical literature, including scientific literature.
Alas, except for the description and schemes of battles, little has been found.
In addition, studies took up most of the time. I was, as today's youth say, a “botanist”. That is, he plowed himself. Specialty "industrial and civil construction" and even specialization in the department "Architecture" - these are drawings, drawings and again drawings. Moreover, computers were then the size of a chest of drawers and were capable of performing only elementary calculations. True, calculators have already appeared. Domestic "Electronics" had decent dimensions. And imported "Casio" and "Citizen" were too heavy for the student. We never dreamed of drawing on a computer.
However, trips to the Artillery Museum made it possible to formulate knowledge about the weapons of that era in sufficient detail. Both the Russian and the Prussian armies. Fortunately, both domestic and captured weapons in the museum were in abundance.
There are many cannons of the pre-Petrine era in the halls and in the open areas of the museum, but it was not very interesting to draw barrels without gun carriages. Cannons from the times of Narva and Poltava: alas, the drawings have not survived. Somewhere I "sowed" them when moving. But for the Seven Years War, the graphics have been preserved.
And although my main specialty in publishing is illustrations in magazines and books, the epistolary genre is not alien to me either.
One day, picking up my archive, I found drawings of the guns of the Seven Years War. Including Shuvalov howitzers. Why not talk about them? Moreover, they became the forerunners of the guns that received the name "unicorns" in the Russian army and served faithfully for over 100 years.
The same V. Pikul wrote (sorry, not literally), they say, take a hole, frame it with bronze - and you will get a gun. In fact, not everything is so simple.
Creating a regular army, Peter I paid great attention to the development of artillery. A large number of guns that did not meet the requirements of the time were inherited from the streltsy troops of the new Russian army. These were guns and mortars, which differed significantly in caliber and design. Field artillery was practically absent. Peter I made an attempt to unify the system of artillery weapons. During his reign, the number of gun calibers significantly decreased and the design of carriages and machine tools was simplified. New cannons with shortened barrels - howitzers - appeared. These guns could fire not only flat but also hinged fire. However, the idea of improving the combat characteristics of the new guns did not leave the Russian gun-makers. If shooting with cannonballs depended only on the length of the barrel and the charge of gunpowder, then shooting with buckshot required different approaches. Indeed, when fired with buckshot, the bullets fly away from the barrel edge in all directions. Some of them fly above the target, and some burrow into the ground, not reaching the target. In order for most of the buckshot to fly in the horizontal direction, it was necessary, as it were, to "push" the gun barrel to the sides. The first experimental 3-pounder cannon was cast from cast iron by Tula gunsmiths in 1722. She had a rectangular barrel and could fire both cannonballs and buckshot. The trunk included three cores, that is, the width of the trunk was equal to three heights. The new gun passed the tests, but was not adopted for service. Its combat characteristics turned out to be very low. Due to the breakthrough of powder gases into the gaps between the cannonballs and in the corners of the barrel, the firing range was insignificant, most of the buckshot also did not reach the target. The survivability of the gun barrel was also low: cracks formed in the corners of the rectangle due to uneven loading. It became dangerous to shoot from such a gun.
Thirty years later, thanks to the improvement of the technology of making guns, Russian gunsmiths created a new howitzer. The idea of creation belongs to General Feldzheikhmeister Count P.I. Shuvalov. And the gunsmiths Major Musin-Pushkin and the master Stepanov brought it to life. The gun had an oval barrel and a conical charging chamber. This made it possible, on the one hand, to ensure the spread of the bulk of buckshot bullets in the horizontal plane. On the other hand, the barrel survivability increased to an acceptable level. The howitzers were intended primarily to destroy enemy infantry and cavalry on the battlefield. From the middle of 1754, new howitzers began to arrive in the field artillery regiments. At first, the barrels of new guns on the march were covered with covers so that the enemy would not know about their design.
The baptism of fire "secret" howitzers (as they began to be called) received in the battles of the Seven Years War, in battles with the army of Frederick II. In the battle of Gross-Jägersdorf, it is the secret howitzers that play the main role in the victory. This is how the famous writer Valentin Pikul describes these events:
Cossack lava, overtaken by the enemy, swung back in panic. The sharp-faced steppe horses stretched out in flight, flaring their nostrils - in blood, in smoke. No one at Levald's headquarters guessed that this was not a flight of the Cossacks at all - no, it was a risky maneuver ...
Russian infantry made way for the Cossacks. She seemed to be opening the wide gate now, into which the Cossack lava immediately slipped. Now these "gates" must be hastily shut, so that - following the Cossacks - the enemies do not burst into the center of the camp. The infantry opened frantic fire, but did not manage to close the "gates" ... I did not have time and could not!
The solid Prussian cavalry, shining with armor, “flowed squarely, in the best order, like a kind of fast river” right inside the Russian square. The front was broken through, broken through, broken through ... The cuirassiers were cutting down all who came to hand in a row.
- I don't see anything, - Lewald stomped impatiently with his boots, - Who will explain to me what happened there?
And this is what happened ...
The attack of the Cossacks was deceiving, they deliberately brought cuirassiers directly under the Russian canister. The howitzers bounced off so well that the whole Prussian squadron (just the middle one in the column) immediately fell to the ground. Now "some fast river" suddenly appeared to be torn apart in its stormy, fearless current. The cuirassiers, who "had already jumped into our frunt, fell into a trap like a mouse, and they were all forced to perish in the most merciless manner."
Valentin Pikul, of course, bent about the "drove up". Alas, the design of the carriages of field guns did not allow them to be quickly moved across the battlefield.
Most likely, the position of the howitzers was prepared in advance, and the Cossacks simply brought Prussian cuirassiers under the barrels of the guns. And then - a matter of technology.
However, the desire to be able to quickly move artillery pieces across the field in less than 50 years will lead to the appearance of horse artillery in European armies.
However, the "secret" howitzers did not last long in service with the field artillery of the Russian army. Still, the survivability of the barrel was lower than that of conventional guns, and firing cannonballs from them was almost impossible. And most importantly, new systems of artillery pieces - "unicorns" - appeared in the Russian army. Based on howitzers, they had a longer barrel and a conical loading chamber. Ballistic performance was outstanding for its time. Unicorns have been in service with the Russian army for over a hundred years. But that's another story.
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