Mystery Gun: Anyone know what this is?

[dcicero]

All:

 

A friend's son is working on his Eagle Scout project.  He contacted a local VFW hall and asked if he could clean up the gun outside the post.  Here's a picture.

 

 

 

There's a nameplate on the gun which identifies the carriage as a 4" carriage, Mark XII, Mod 1.  It was built by the Goss Printing Press Company of Chicago, IL in 1918.

 

 

 

The gun was moved to the VFW hall a long time ago from a park in Aurora, IL.  No one has any information about it.  The project is finished now.  The base was cleaned and painted.  The old paint was scraped off and the gun repainted.  All the brass has been shined.  All the weeds have been removed, new flower beds cut in and mulch laid down.  The gun looks much better than it did.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To finish the project off, the new Eagle Scout is going to make a presentation to the VFW Post.  I'd like to help him put in some information about the gun itself.

 

Anyone got any ideas what this gun is?  Where might it have been used?  (I'm thinking it might have been a coast defense gun.) 

 

 

 

Dan

[trippwj]

What a fantastic eagle project!  The result is fantastic!

 

It is probable that the placard for the carriage is not the manufacturer of the gun itself.  i came across this reference from Navy ordnance activities. World war, 1917-1918 available for download at https://archive.org/details/navyordnanceact00ordngoog

The Goss Printing Press Co., had total contracts for two hundred 4-inch and one hundred 6-inch mounts. Here again the equipment and organization were such as to insure deliveries of satisfactory materials. At one time during the life of the 4-inch contract this company was having trouble in the manufacture of sights. An ap- peal was made to the bureau for assistance, and it was possible to arrange for Mr. Bunback of the gun factory to take temporary em- ployment with the company. Through his efforts and the naturally effective organization of this company the sight troubles were soon eliminated. The 6-inch contract was given to this company under rather unusual conditions. There were at the gun factory about fifty 6-inch 50-caliber broadside guns which were being held in reserve in accordance with bureau policy to replace guns in service when it became necessary to reline them. There were, however, no mounts for these guns, and the guns were badly needed in service for the arming of transports. It was therefore decided to place a contract for one hundred 6-inch 53-caliber mounts which would be needed later on for the broadside batteries of battle cruisers and for 50 additional slides which could be used to mount the 6-inch 50- caliber guns in the 6-inch 53-caliber mount. This contract after com- petitive bids was awarded to the Goss Printing Press Co. 

Need to do a bit more digging in this reference to figure out who manufactured the 4 inch gun that Goss manufactured the mounts and sites for.

Edited October 29, 2013 by trippwj

[dcicero]

Wayne, this is tremendous!

 

Thanks for posting.  I downloaded the reference and I'll bet I can find some additional information.

 

Believe it or not, the Goss Printing Press Company still exists.  They're Goss International now.  The company's been bought and sold a few times.  I dropped them an email to see if they had any information.

 

I'm also planning to talk with the research librarian at the local library.  There's probably some information out there about moving the gun from the park to the VFW hall and about putting the gun in place in the park.  There are a couple of really big naval guns still in the park, so there was probably a ceremony of some kind when they were put there and that would have been reported in the Aurora Beacon-News.

 

 

 

Dan

[Jay 1]

Hi Dan,

 

Based on my 20+ years of experience as an US Explosive Ordnance Disposal technician, I'd say it's a World War 1 through 1940s era Navy 4" / 50.  The gun was used on a variety of vessels during that period (guns as opposed to artillery, generally have more elongated rifling and thus fire flatter trajectories and were used on both shore and ships, to include submarine deck guns).  Although a weapons system may be date stamped, that stamp does not limit the system to being used strictly during that time frame--that's why I gave a wide time span above.

 

Here's a link to Wikipedia that has some info. on 4" / 50s:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4%22/50_caliber_gun

 

And here's a NAVWEPS link:  http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_4-50_mk9_pics.htm

 

Here's the cross ref from the MK XII Mod 1 carriage to the gun:  Historic Naval Ships Visitors Guide - Gun Mount and Turret Catalog.pdf

 

If the scout does some digging on the shells used in the gun (he'll need to find out the MK numbers and, as applicable, the Mod number(s) used in the piece; general info. won't be as easy to cross reference / research), he can likely find out detailed specifics on shells (the correct term is "projectiles," our slang term in EOD was "projo," which my spell check hates )  in the projo chapter (Ch. 1, 4" projos) of OP 1664:  http://www.hnsa.org/doc/ordnance/index.htm

 

As an afterthought, here's the detailed info. on 4" / 50s from NAVWEPS:  http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_4-50_mk9.htm

 

Cheers,

Jay

Edited October 30, 2013 by JMaitri

[jud]

Jay, thanks for the links, never ran into that gun, before my time. I was looking at the posted picture, trying to determine what kind of breach it had, because of the compactness, I was thinking it must be an Interrupted Thread System, your link bore that out and also showing that it used fixed ammunition. Be kind of neat to get a hands on look.

jud

Edited October 30, 2013 by jud

[Jay 1]

You're welcome, Jud--yep, the gun was before my time too! While weapons themselves weren't what we focused on when I was in EOD, we knew and understood them well enough to be general menaces to GMs/GMGs, AOs, and mortar/artillery crews--lol. The ordnance, explosives, and etc. were really our bailiwick. Yep, smaller bore guns usually fired fixed ammo though in the early days it wasn't uncommon for large field artillery pieces to use fixed ammo too (some of the brass cases from World War 1 are amazing to see--saw some stunning examples in France a few years back). It's been a few moons since I researched an older weapons system, and it was nice to see a few of the key unclass pubs on the web and share them!

 

Jay

[dcicero]

Thanks, Jay!  This is just great stuff and will help a great deal.

 

I continue to be amazed by the amount of knowledge possessed by the people here on Model Ship World.  And thanks for your service.  There aren't a lot of people who'd sign up for that EOD job, I'm sure, but someone's got to do it!

 

 

 

 

Dan

[Jay 1]

Thanks, Dan--glad I could lend a hand!

 

Jay

[dcicero]

Gentlemen,

 

I got a little bit more information from Taggart Lohman, the Eagle Scout.  Here are two pictures of markings on the gun barrel.

 

Taggart's going to make his presentation to the VFW on Sunday.  He really appreciated the help you all gave him.  I think it surprised him that this amount of information is out there and that people know how to find it!

 

 

 

I know these markings are indistinct, but do they provide any additional information about what this gun is?

 

 

 

Dan

[trippwj]

Those are definitely of value!

 

The Root & Van Dervoort Engineering Company was an East Moline, IL Company. 

 

http://www.oldengine.org/members/plowe/rv-engines/rvpage.htm

 

William VanDervoort's far sightedness and his ability to visualize the approaching events which preceded America's entrance into World War 1, lead the R&V Co. to be of such great use to the US government in the crisis.

 

R&V Ordnance Co. became a great plant in the manufacture of shells and guns for the British, and upon the completion of these big contracts the ordnance plant was closed, the doors locked, but the machinery kept in tact. Eighteen months later America entered the war and R&V has a factory which stood ready to produce ordnance. R&V's leadership in this field was testified by many men in public life and by government officials.

The R&V-Wagner Ordnance Co. was (a partnership with the Wagner Electric Co. of St. Louis, Missouri) and produced almost a million shells from 1916 until 1918. They only did the machining, no packing or loading. They also exclusively manufactured 4-inch and 1-pounder naval guns and 3" naval dock mounts.

Also during this period the Root & VanDervoort Engineering Co., was operating exclusively on 8" shells, special shell manufacturing lathes, tractor and farm motors - all war essentials. This work comprised 80% of the companies total output. The shell manufacturing lathes were sold to other companies assisting with ordnance.

After the war they moved car production to the ordnance plant. It was later sold to Yellow Cab which became a part of General Motors. GM closed it in 1929 and it burned in the early 40's.

William VanDervoort was a member of the "Munition Standards Board" and also the "National War Labor Conference Board". During the war period he gave all his time as a member of these important bodies.

William VanDervoort was particularly zealous in creating an intimate feeling between employer and employees, his attitude towards his workmen won him respect and admiration from near and far. This was also R&V's key to successful plant output from all its divisions.

 

A Google search for root & vandervoort guns turns up many authoritative references to the production etc. 

[Jay 1]

Dan, the Mark (Mk) and Mod numbers specifically ID the gun ( see: http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNUS_4-50_mk9.htm ). The additional numbers below can be for a couple of possible things: tube serial numbers, lot numbers, or re-work IDs (tubes that have been fired a lot will get re-worked and then are returned to service, usually they are marked with IDs). However, the numbers you really care about are Mk & Mods--those specifically identify a gun, so check those out in the NAVWEPS link and play with Google as well.

 

Cheers,

Jay

[dcicero]

Again, thanks very much!

 

I've passed all this information along to Taggart and have done a little googling around to see what I can find.  I'm betting the presentation is going to be pretty good!

 

 

 

Dan

[trippwj]

One final source for even more detail, should Taggart desire it, is here _

http://www.hnsa.org/doc/guncat/cat-0121.htm

 

ORDNANCE PAMPHLET 1112 (SECOND REVISION)

Dated 1945 - declassified in 1970

 

Best wishes on his project - please let me know the outcome!

 

Wayne

Eagle Scout, class of 1977

Edited November 8, 2013 by trippwj

[dcicero]

Thanks again to everyone who helped out with the research associated with Taggart's Eagle Scout project.  It's finished off now and they had a very nice ceremony at the VFW Hall.  I thought everyone here might want to see the write-up that appeared in the local paper.

 

 

 

Dan

 

11212013 The Voice _Tag's Eagle Project.pdf

 

 

[trippwj]

Thank you, Dan, and please pass on my congratulations to Taggart.  It will be a great honor to welcome taggart to the group of men who have earned the Eagle award.

 

Eagle Class of 1977 - Troop 880, Connecticut.