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Are these Stokes Bombs ?
- Thread starter Gspragge
- Start date
The Stokes rounds would be 3" diameter and about 18" total length. The crate at the right side which is standing sideways from the gound has something on top of it. The crate looks more like either .303 ammnition or a No 36 grenade crate. But the item on the crate has the shape of a Stokes round but seems too short in lenght. My first thought was it being a French WWI barbed wire destruction grenade which had a stick in the center to put it in position by a post with wire.
Hans : "This is the Englischer Lewis gun, the Devil's Paintbrush".
Fritz : "Ach ya, we need something like this, I'm sick of carting MG08s around".
Hans " "We also needs these Stokes bombs on your left, I'm sick of carting minenwerfers around"
As that's a Lewis giun, tis appears to be a British trench they've captured. So everything in the shot should be British.
I agree from this angle the Stokes bombs appear shorter than normal.. either the camera lens is responsible for this or they are in fact short Stokes bombs.. I've seen images of short bombs elsewhere, could be smoke rounds. But they definitely look like Stokes ammo.
Fritz : "Ach ya, we need something like this, I'm sick of carting MG08s around".
Hans " "We also needs these Stokes bombs on your left, I'm sick of carting minenwerfers around"
As that's a Lewis giun, tis appears to be a British trench they've captured. So everything in the shot should be British.
I agree from this angle the Stokes bombs appear shorter than normal.. either the camera lens is responsible for this or they are in fact short Stokes bombs.. I've seen images of short bombs elsewhere, could be smoke rounds. But they definitely look like Stokes ammo.
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I may have come into this thread a tad late chaps, but all of the boxes.. except the one which is on end at the bottom of the trench.. are 3inch Stokes Mortar Bomb Crates. The item laying on top of the on-end box is also a 3inch Stokes Bomb. They are all normal size, as its the camera angle which is slightly decieving. The on-end box is for the Mills-36 Grenade. Last, but not at all least, the item being examined by the soldier in the helmet... is indeed a Lewis Machine Gun. These two soldiers, and the ones behind them, are doing what all soldiers do during a lull in the fighting after capturing an enemy trench.... they are souviner hunting -or- scrounging. The soldier on the right has procured himseld an entrenching tool (over his shoulder), and a GS-Shovel (in his right hand) 