Panthers were supplied to form Panzer Abteilung 51 (Tank Battalion 51) on 9 January, and then Pz.Abt. 52 on 6 February 1943. The first production Panther tanks were plagued with mechanical problems. The engine was dangerously prone to overheating and suffered from connecting rod or bearing failures. Gasoline leaks from the fuel pump or carburetor, […]…
Category: History of Weapons
Know Your WW2 History: Jagdtiger SdKfz 186
The heaviest armored vehicle fielded by the Germans in World War II was the Panzerjäger Tiger Ausf B. This was built on a slightly lengthened Tiger II chassis topped with a fixed casemate and a 12.8 cm PaK 44 L/55 antitank gun. It weighed seventy-nine tons. A few early versions of the Jagdtiger had a […]…
Know Your Weapons: Soviet WWII Machine Guns
The Soviets were latecomers to machine-gun development generally. Prior to World War I, the czarist army bought machine guns from other countries and manufactured some under license. For this reason, Russian machine-gun development and production had to start virtually from scratch after the Russian Revolution. A top priority was the development of a light machine […]…
We Accept Death, We Hand Out Death II
The forty-three-year-old Gruppenführer Hermann Priess commanded the I SS Corps, formerly Sepp Dietrich’s old formation, which contained 1st and 12th Panzer Divisions, totalling around 240 panzers on 16 December. We have seen via Dietrich’s career how the Leibstandarte expanded from a motorised regiment in 1939 to the largest division in the armed forces by December […]…
The Viking “Great Army”
The Operations of the ‘Great Army’ in Britain (865–79) The term ‘great army’, employed by several contemporary sources to describe this unusually large assemblage of Norse raiders, implies a huge horde of perhaps tens of thousands, but it most probably was not. Although no precise figures are given, it is highly doubtful that it numbered […]…
THE VIKINGS IN IRELAND 795–1014 Part I
I am reading a short novel right now about the Vikings in Ireland so I found this fascinating. Few places suffered more at the hands of the Vikings than Ireland. For the best part of 200 years the Vikings systematically milked Ireland of its people to supply the slave trade, yet, for all their military…
Military Organisation of the Holy Roman Empire
Know Your History, it’s Interesting Reading! Although firmly rooted and fairly well developed in the Rhineland, Franconia, Lorraine (the old Lotharingia) and Burgundy, feudalism in its widest sense was never as strong in Germany as in, say, France or England, and true knighthood and the customary granting of fiefs was unknown in Germany until…
Know Your Weapons: Hungarian 44M “Mace Thrower”
Hungarian Army: 44M “Mace Thrower” I am always interested in Partisan warfare and weaponry and this one is amazing. Stay Alert, Armed and Dangerous!
Know Your Weapons History: Oliver Winchester
Oliver Winchester was born in Boston, on November 30, 1810. He started his career with a clothing company based out of New York City and New Haven, Connecticut. After successfully running this aspect of his business, Winchester began to look for new opportunities. Horace Smith and Daniel Wesson (yes, that “Smith & Wesson” who later…
MG-42: German Machine Gun
Know Your Weapons!